


You Got the Heart of a Phoenix (So Let Them See You Rise)

by iam93percentstardust



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant through Winter Soldier, Canon-Typical Violence, Comic Book Science, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Kidnapping, M/M, Misunderstandings, Past Child Abuse, Pining, Temporary Character Death, eventually
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2020-02-09
Packaged: 2020-03-04 20:26:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 86,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18820096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iam93percentstardust/pseuds/iam93percentstardust
Summary: Tony is born with a soulmark.Everyone is born with a mark- unless their soulmate is already dead. What’s unusual is how sometimes Tony has a mark and sometimes he doesn’t.No one knows what to do with that. Marks only disappear when a person’s soulmate is dead. But one day, Tony had a mark and then the next he didn’t. Tony had barely had enough time to realize that something was wrong before it was back.~Steve is also born with a mark.But when Steve is injected with the serum, his mark changes. Marks aren’t supposed to change. They’re supposed to remain static, as static as the fact that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.~The Asset doesn't know if he was born with a mark or not.He would probably say that he was born with one because everyone seems to have one but, if it's not important to his mission, then he doesn't know.He does have one though. It appears immediately on his metal arm the first time they attach it to his shoulder.~Everyone is born with a soulmark but some people's marks are faulty.





	1. You Got the Heart of a Phoenix

**Author's Note:**

> Look, this is cliche as hell and I know that but I can't get it out of my head so I'm putting it down on paper instead.  
> A little bit about this universe: I've decided that homophobia isn't a thing because I don't think that makes a whole lot of sense in a world with soulmates. Soulmarks, since they tend to belong to (at least) two people, don't have to be representative of the people they belong to but they often are.  
> I don't have an updating schedule because I'm working on five other stories at the same time and I'm just writing as inspiration strikes.  
> Fic and chapter titles taken from Olivia Holt's "Phoenix."
> 
> !!!!!!!!!WARNING FOR THIS CHAPTER: CHILD ABUSE!!!!!!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Tony has a defective mark, becomes Iron Man, joins the Avengers, falls in love with Steve Rogers, and finds his soulmate.

Tony Stark is born with a soulmark.

This, in and of itself, is not unusual. Everyone is born with a soulmark- unless, of course, their soulmate is already dead. What’s more unusual is how sometimes Tony has a soulmark and sometimes he doesn’t.

And, well, no one quite knows what to do with that. After all, soulmarks only disappear when a person’s soulmate is dead. But one day, Tony had a soulmark and then the next he didn’t. Tony had barely had enough time to realize that something was wrong before it was back.

Tony had been two. He’d immediately known that something was wrong and toddled off to show Jarvis (even at that age, he’d known better than to bring a problem to his parents). Jarvis had frowned as Tony’s mark flickered again and then he’d taken Tony to see Howard anyway.

Howard hadn’t much liked Tony’s soulmark. When he was younger, Tony thought it was because Howard didn’t like soulmarks- and, by extension soulmates- in general (Howard’s mark- a slate grey mushroom cloud- didn’t match Maria’s- a green leaf shot through with veins of gold). It takes nearly forty years for Tony to realize that it was really just Tony’s mark that Howard had a problem with, that Tony’s mark was something bitterly familiar, a reminder of Howard’s greatest failure.

But that comes later.

* * *

For now, Tony is seven and sprawled across the library floor because he’d dared to suggest that he could improve on one of Howard’s designs. He knows as soon as the words leave his mouth that he’s made a mistake and he tries to take them back but Howard’s already heard him. He barely has enough time to brace himself for the backhanded slap but he’s only a child and he lands hard on his left arm.

There’s a sharp crack and then a blinding pain in his wrist. Tony whimpers, a low sound that becomes a cry when Howard grabs the injured wrist to drag him up. His feet scrabble at the ground, barely able to find purchase when Howard lifts him higher.

“Think I’m wrong, do you, boy?” Howard hisses. “Think I’ve made a mistake?” He hums mockingly, waiting for an answer.

Tony doesn’t quite yet know what answer Howard wants at times like this (that knowledge comes later, with experience and age) so he stutters out, “I- I just thought that- that you might have- have missed something.”

Howard’s face goes apoplectic with rage and Tony winces. “Missed something?” he shouts. He brings his face close to Tony so that he can smell the alcohol on his breath. At this point, Tony does know not to flinch- because “Stark men are made of iron, boy”- so he stands his ground as best as he can when he’s dangling a few inches off the ground.

“You think you know better than me, is that it?” Howard snaps. “You think you’re so smart? Let me tell you something about the only mistake I see here. This-” He shakes Tony’s wrist and Tony cries out as the bones grind against each other. As they watch, the mark flickers before disappearing. “This means you’re defective. You know what that means? You’re a mistake. The universe itself said you don’t deserve this soulmate.”

“That’s not true,” Tony says as bravely as he can through the waves of pain.

“No?” Howard laughs harshly. “Then you tell me. What does it mean?”

And Tony doesn’t know what to say to that. How could he? All the money and all the best doctors Maria could find hadn’t been able to tell them why Tony’s mark flickered like that. But he stubbornly repeats, “That’s not true.”

Howard sneers and throws him back down before stalking off. Tony slowly gets back up cradling his probably broken wrist to his chest and goes to find Jarvis.

It’s the first time Tony’s ever been told that his mark makes him worthless but it’s not the last. Howard certainly makes sure to remind him of that every chance he gets but it isn’t just Howard.

It happens when Tony is ten and the Fujikawa heir (with a pretty red rose on her wrist) innocently asks him what’s wrong with his mark when she happens to see it disappear. Tony starts wearing a band around his wrist so that people can’t see his mark.

It happens when Tony is thirteen and one of the boys at boarding school rips off his band and calls him a freak.

It happens when Tony is seventeen and walking out on Ty for the last time and Ty screams after him that no one else could ever want him, that there’s something wrong with him (Rhodey sits with him in their room after that and tucks Tony’s head under his chin and tells him fiercely that there is absolutely nothing wrong with him but the damage has already been done).

It happens when Tony is twenty-one and his parents are being laid in their graves and Obie suggests to him that the company would be more stable if Tony settled down with a wife and had the two kids and house with a picket fence. His eyes briefly glance down at Tony’s soulmark but he doesn’t suggest that Tony find his soulmate, just a wife.

It happens when Tony is twenty-three and yet another reporter- the fifth that day- asks if Tony’s found his soulmate yet. While it’s not exactly unusual for celebrities to hide their marks, it’s far more common for celebrities to go around with uncovered marks, whether it’s because they want the free press or because they’re hoping their soulmate will see it. But Tony has long since come to accept that there’s no soulmate out there for him and so he locks himself in his workshop and emerges four days later with a brand-new AI and a synthetic hyper-realistic graft (he calls it a SKIN- Synthetic Kinesthetic INhibitor) over his now-bare wrist.

The reporters stop asking about his soulmate.

* * *

He’s thirty when Rhodey’s soulmate comes to meet him for lunch. Rhodey’s in Tony’s office, spinning aimlessly on a chair and complaining about the new contract the DOD opened up with Hammer Industries. Tony is filing paperwork (contrary to popular belief, he does actually get paperwork done, it’s not like he can run a Fortune 500 company without it) when the door opens and a slender, red-haired woman steps inside.

“Security breach!” Tony exclaims. “Julia, you’re fired!”

“You can’t fire me!” Julia, his latest assistant, yells back. “Mr. Stane hired me.”

“Damn,” Tony mutters. He’d really looked forward to being able to fire Julia. She was utterly incompetent. Tony had slept with her a few weeks ago, hoping that she’d quit afterwards (because they always did) and instead she just turned completely clingy.

“Actually,” the red-haired woman says, “Julia let me in. I’m looking for Jim.”

Rhodey stops his complaining, spins to face her, and delightedly says, “Virginia!”

Before Tony can stop himself, he makes a face and goes, “Virginia? God, that’s awful.”

Rhodey looks horrified but Virginia just looks at him. “It’s the only name I’ve got. Get over it.”

A slow smile spreads across Tony’s face. Deliberately, he reaches forward with his left hand to shake her hand. “Tony Stark,” he says.

Virginia doesn’t even look at his wrist as she shakes his hand though Tony glances down to see a set of salt and pepper shakers on hers- a perfect match to Rhodey’s. “Virginia Potts.”

Three weeks later, Julia’s been fired. He hires Virginia in her place. A month after that, he calls her Pepper for the first time. He means for it to be because of her mark but she thinks it’s because of her hair and freckles. She slaps him and quits on the spot. It takes three days of groveling, an explanation from Tony about how he meant her mark, and an explanation from Rhodey about how Tony gives nicknames to people he likes for her to come back.

Even so, it’s another few months before he hesitantly calls her Pepper again. This time, Pepper gives him a beautiful smile and thanks him for the nickname.

It lingers in the back of his mind though that Pepper’s first thought is to assume that he was making fun of her. He doesn’t blame her for thinking it. Tony doesn’t exactly make himself likeable and he knows he makes her life difficult. He’s an alcoholic and he sleeps around and one time, he accidentally lets a corporate spy into his workshop (he later puts Baintronics out of business but it still hurts that Sunset had done that to him).

So, no, he doesn’t blame her for thinking the worst of him.

It keeps him from telling her about his soulmark though. Even though she hasn’t said anything about his blank wrist, he stays quiet. He doesn’t want her to judge him for his dysfunctional mark. It isn’t until after Afghanistan, after Tony puts on the suit for the first time, after he saves Gulmira, that Pepper finally sees his mark.

“Let’s face it. This is not the worst thing you’ve caught me doing,” he says.

Pepper replies, “Are those bullet holes?” Her gaze catches on something a little lower than his face and she stills. “Tony- is that- do you have a mark?”

Tony follows her gaze to see that the disassembly machine managed to rip the SKIN off his wrist. His mark disappears before their eyes and Pepper gasps.

“Tony, I’m so sorry,” she begins but Tony holds up a hand to stop her.

“It’ll be back,” he says.

Pepper stills. “It- what?”

Tony shrugs as best he can while in the suit and repeats, “It’ll be back. It always is.” As he speaks, the mark reappears. Pepper can’t seem to tear her eyes away from it and Tony braces himself for the condemnation in her next words.

But all Pepper does is move closer. She reaches up to run her thumb over his mark, over the gold in the phoenix’s wings and the bright blue of the flames, and murmurs, “You shouldn’t have to hide this. It’s beautiful.”

It wasn’t what Tony was expecting and so his next words are harsher than they should be. “It’s defective,” he snaps.

Pepper doesn’t flinch though. Instead she presses a soft kiss to his wrist and says, “No. It’s not defective. You just don’t understand it yet.”

“What’s there to understand? It’s a magic symbol that can’t decide if my soulmate is alive or dead. Obviously, that means there’s something wrong with me. There’s nothing else to understand!”

He’s shouting by the end and he _hates_ that. He hates that this is just another way that he’s like Howard. But Pepper doesn’t run away from him, she doesn’t wince, she doesn’t yell back at him. She’s just looking at him with something soft in her eyes (pity he thinks and then amends it to sympathy) and when the machine finally works and Tony falls forward from the armor, she catches him in a tight hug.

“There is _nothing_ wrong with you,” she says fiercely. “Don’t you keep telling me that magic is just science we don’t understand yet? So, understand _this_.” She taps his mark firmly and then smooths the SKIN back over it.

She leaves him with that to think about it- and Tony does. He thinks hard about what Pepper said, about figuring out how to understand his mark. He tries. God, does he try but it’s not exactly easy. No one else out there has a mark quite like his. There’re a few people out there who’ve had a mark that disappeared and reappeared but only ever once and only ever when their soulmate had a near-death experience. Tony’s never even met his soulmate and, frankly, he’d be concerned if his soulmate was having near-death experiences that often.

It stops being important though when he first spots black lines racing away from the arc reactor. Then he hears the words “palladium poisoning” and the idea of understanding his soulmark is completely driven from his mind.

* * *

There’s something off about Natalie Rushman.

Tony takes one look at her- first, at the way she’s carrying herself so that her breasts and ass are her most noticeable features and then at how she’s the only one legal sent down to supervise Tony signing over his company (and Tony remembers how the board insisted on at least three senior members of the legal department present when he took over from Howard)- and knows immediately that something is wrong.

He pulls her up on his tablet and is instantly presented with a picture-perfect view of Natalie Rushman- high school valedictorian, graduated with honors from Stanford, underwear model in Japan. This woman seems absolutely perfect. It’s setting off warning bells in his head.

She reminds him of Sunset Bain.

He doesn’t like that. He doesn’t like that _at all_. Sunset was a mistake best never to be repeated. He doesn’t want that to happen to Pepper right after she’s taken over the company. Natalie Rushman doesn’t need to be anywhere near Pepper and she certainly doesn’t need to be near legal who handles patents and public relations and all the other sensitive stuff.

Then she slams Happy to the ground and, even through his shock, Tony is discarding the thought of her being a corporate spy and putting the word “kidnapper” in its place.

It becomes even more important to make sure she’s far away from Pepper. Tony’s replaceable and dying anyway but Pepper- Pepper is indispensable.

It’s the work of a single phone call to move Natalie from legal into the open position of his assistant. Tony doesn’t really need an assistant anymore, now that he’s retired from his position as CEO, but if making Natalie his new assistant and forcing her to run petty errands for him keeps her from Pepper then Tony will gladly ask her to pick up his dry cleaning and take out the trash.

Of course, then it turns out that Natalie is neither a kidnapper nor a corporate spy, just a normal spy working for SHIELD. It’s infuriating that Fury moved someone into his company just to spy on him. He supposes that, in a twisted sort of way, it makes sense. Tony signed over his company. He let Rhodey steal a suit. From an outside perspective, he probably would have thought that there was something fishy going on too. But that doesn’t make it right. Fury had no right to put a spy in Tony’s company, especially not when corporate espionage is such a problem in tech fields.

But he swallows his words, lets her stay while he solves the problem of the arc reactor, and then bites back a smile when Pepper discovers Natasha Romanoff’s true identity and rains down fire on both her and Fury. She’s incandescently furious that Fury just assumed he had the right to place Romanoff at SI, even more so when it turns out that she hadn’t actually been hired by HR but had instead hacked into SI’s systems and hired herself (Tony fixes that gap in their security systems real quick). Pepper threatens to sue for corporate espionage, citing that she doesn’t know how many SI secrets Romanoff was able to walk off with, even though SHIELD is a shady government organization that only sort of exists and therefore probably can’t be sued.

Tony thinks it’s a shame that Pepper is Rhodey’s soulmate and not his because her rant is a thing of beauty and he falls a little in love with her.

Fury has to have the last laugh though and Tony can’t deny how much his heart aches when he reads the words _Iron Man, yes; Tony Stark, not recommended_. It’s just another reminder of how he’s not good enough, how he’s a mistake. He says something flippant back at Fury and leaves with a promise to have Senator Stern presenting the medals he and Rhodey are receiving.

He goes to Pepper and Rhodey’s home afterwards, shows them Fury’s file. They let him lay down on their couch, head in Pepper’s lap and feet in Rhodey’s, as they watch some stupid 80’s film. Pepper’s fingers card through his hair as a wordless comfort. Tony’s more comforted by the knowledge that even if they aren’t his soulmates, these two amazing and wonderful people love him.

* * *

It’s a year and a half before Tony hears from SHIELD again. In that time, he’s managed to track down the last of the illegal weapons caches and helped Pepper build Stark Tower, turning SI into one of the foremost companies championing clean energy.

Actually, Pepper has heard more from SHIELD than he has. Romanoff, he knows, has visited SI a couple of times. Pepper tells him that she’s trying to see her because they’d apparently become friends during Romanoff’s employment. Pepper keeps turning her away though.

“Anyone who looks at you that shallowly is no friend of mine,” she tells Tony when he asks why she won’t see Romanoff.

Tony doesn’t tell her how much that means to him but he suspects she knows anyway from the way she smiles at him after he hugs her.

Three months later, Agent Coulson hands him a file about a missing energy source and the Avengers Initiative. Tony takes a look at Captain America’s file and notes when they’d found him in the ice.

“So that’s what we found,” he murmurs. He’d known that SI had found something last year but SHIELD had swooped in before the word had spread. Tony had been trying to hack into SHIELD’s files to figure out just what SI had discovered but they’d known better than to keep an electronic copy of that file.

He gives himself a refresher course on thermonuclear astrophysics and then suits up, flying out that night. 

* * *

Tony wants to like Captain America, he really does. But it’s clear from the start that Captain America doesn’t like him and, well, Tony has _never_ reacted well to people not liking him and he’s _always_ been good at needling and pushing people’s buttons. It isn’t really a surprise that things escalate between them the way they do.

The explosion rocks the helicarrier and Rogers orders him to put on the suit. Tony hurries off in the opposite direction from Rogers. The moment he’s out of sight, he stops and leans against a wall, taking a moment to mourn the loss of a potential friendship. Aunt Peggy had always told him such wonderful things about Steve Rogers and, while those stories had been offset with Howard’s own hero worship of Captain America, Tony had long thought that he would have liked to be friends with Rogers.

But it’s clear from their argument in the lab that that’s never going to happen. Rogers had made it obvious that he had a very low opinion of Tony. For his part, Tony, despite all of his self-destructive tendencies, isn’t willing to be friends with someone who thinks as little of him as Rogers does.

“No sense in crying over spilled milk,” he mutters and pushes off the wall.

* * *

After- after the battle, after Loki’s imprisonment, after the Avengers splinter into their little groups- Rogers comes by the tower.

Tony’s in the penthouse, pouring a drink and surveying the damage Loki had wrought upon his brand-new tower. Bruce is somewhere around, probably down in one of the labs, but he’s not in the penthouse which is why Tony feels perfectly justified in his shriek when he turns and sees Captain America standing in his living room.

“Jesus, don’t do that!” he exclaims.

Rogers looks a little sheepish but more amused by the noise Tony had made. “Sorry,” he says. “Your…voice let me in.”

“That’s JARVIS. He runs the tower.”

He takes a sip of his drink, gratified to find that only a little bit had spilled when he’d jumped, and eyes Rogers over the rim of his glass. “Thought you were supposed to be going on the Great American Road Trip,” he comments.

Rogers shrugs. “I am but I realized I needed to do something first.”

“And what’s that?”

“Apologize.”

Tony spits out what he’d just drunk. “ _What_?”

Rogers can’t seem to hide his smirk this time. Tony has the feeling that he’d timed his words specifically for that moment. Then his smirk fades and he says, “About what I said on the helicarrier-”

“Don’t worry about it-”

“No, what I said was wrong-”

“I said some pretty hurtful things too-”

“And I misjudged you-”

“You don’t need to worry about saying what’s really the truth-”

“Dammit, Tony, will you just let me apologize?!”

Tony freezes. Then- “You swore!” he says gleefully. “Dad said you never swore.”

“I guess you just bring out that quality in me,” Rogers says dryly. “Now will you let me talk?” Tony motions for him to continue. “Look, I let what was in your file and Loki’s scepter influence how I saw you and I shouldn’t have. You _are_ a hero, Tony. I’d like to ask you to join the Avengers.”

Tony fidgets. “Not as a consultant?” he asks. It comes out more vulnerable than he means it to.

Rogers- Steve, he supposes, since he called Tony by his name first- shakes his head. “Not as a consultant. A full team member.”

Tony’s mouth twists. “I don’t have a brain-to-mouth filter. I’ll say hurtful things again.”

“So will I probably.”

“And I’m a terrible team player.”

“I think we worked pretty well today.”

“And I’ll probably take more stupid risks.”

“We’ll work on that.”

“You’re sure you want me to be an Avenger?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

Steve holds out his hand. Tony hesitates a moment more- he still remembers telling the world that he wasn’t the hero type- and then slowly reaches out to shake it. It feels almost momentous.

There’s a moment where Steve looks at Tony like he had when Tony had woken up, full of relief and delight, and his mouth parts like he wants to say something but all that comes out is, “I’ll let you get back to-”

“Planning,” Tony interrupts as Steve moves away. “I’ll have to rebuild. Guess I’m just envisioning what I’ll improve…” He trails off as an idea strikes him. “Hey, Cap?”

Steve stops from where he was waiting for the elevator.

“We’ll need a headquarters, right?” Before Steve can say anything, he barrels on. “I’m going to have to renovate the tower anyway. And the tower’s already lost most of the letters in Stark. All that’s left is the A. I could- maybe- build our headquarters here.”

He waits anxiously to see what Steve will say. He’s never lived with anyone before. Well, there was Rhodey but Rhodey doesn’t count. He knows he isn’t the easiest person to get along with but he really wants this team to work now that he’s been invited to join. A team headquarters would be a great idea, in his opinion, but he really doesn’t want it to be at SHIELD. Fury’s organization makes him more than a little wary.

To his relief, Steve smiles broadly. “I think that’d be great. That’s- that’s really great of you, Tony.”

Tony can’t stop himself from flushing at the praise but he hides it by taking another sip. “You just go on your road trip, Cap. I’ll have the tower ready for you when you get back.” 

* * *

Steve ends up cancelling his road trip. Tony finds him at the tower again the next day, dressed in sweats and a t-shirt two sizes too small for him. He gives him a very puzzled look.

“Not that I’m not delighted to see you, Cap, because I am. But what are you doing here?”

“I’m here to help,” Steve says determinedly.

“…With what?”

Steve falters. “The- the renovations. You were serious about those, right?”

Tony blinks at him, silent long enough that Steve sighs. “I misunderstood. I’ll just go. Sorry to bother you, Mr. Stark.”

He hates that, hates that Steve is calling him Mr. Stark again. Steve turns to leave just as it suddenly clicks in Tony’s mind. He throws up a hand to stop Steve. “Wait!” he blurts out. “You know I can hire people to do the repairs?”

Steve nods, a little defeated, and says, “I know. I just wanted to help.”

Tony eyes him curiously. “Why?”

“I didn’t want you to think that we’re using you.”

Tony cocks his head. He honestly hasn’t even thought of it like that. He won’t deny that the help will be welcome. One of the perks of being a billionaire is that he can pay people to work faster but a supersoldier like Steve would be even better.

“You can help,” he begins. Steve starts to smile and Tony finishes, “On one condition: you can’t call me Mr. Stark ever again.”

Steve laughs. “Deal.”

That first day, it’s just Tony, Steve, and the construction workers. It’s nice is the thing. Tony runs through the plans with everyone- the range, the gym, the common areas, each individual suite. Tony’s already got guest suites for any of his associates and it’s easy enough to draw up plans to remodel those for the Avengers. Steve asks about a Hulk-proof room and Tony admits that he hadn’t been planning on making a specific room, that he’d actually been planning on making all of the Avengers floors Hulk-proof.

“I just don’t want him to feel like we don’t trust him,” Tony says and Steve gives him a big smile.

“I think Bruce will really like that.”

Originally, Tony had been planning on personalizing the rooms for each Avenger but Steve stops him from doing that- “It’s a little creepy, Tony. Who wants to walk into a room and find proof that you read their personal files?” -so instead he has Steve draw up very generic plans to send off to an interior decorator.

They order pizza for lunch, take about an hour-long break, and then they’re deep into hardware mode. It’s cathartic, Tony thinks, as he knocks down a wall, imagining Loki’s face every time he swings the hammer. He can’t break Loki’s face but he can do this instead.

By the time they break for the day, Tony’s sweaty and Steve isn’t much better. He’s grinning broadly as they flop down on the couch. He passes Steve a beer to wash down the rest of the pizza.

“You know I can’t get drunk,” Steve says as he flips the cap off. Tony squirms, suddenly feeling a little hot, because that definitely hadn’t been a twist-off.

He does know that actually. It had been in Howard’s notes about Steve. But he doesn’t say that. Instead, he waves an airy hand and says, “Not the point. Even you must have heard about social drinking.”

Steve frowns slightly and starts picking at the bottle label. “Guess so,” he says. “The Howlies never cared if I drank with ‘em and the dames never wanted me to before the serum.”

Shit, that hadn’t been Tony’s point at all. “You must really miss them,” he says softly.

Steve nods, more morose than he had been. “I keep thinking that I should have been there to see Dum Dum’s first wedding or the birth of Jim’s grandkid. I should have grown old with them.”

Tony smiles sympathetically. Steve had definitely been given a bad lot. He can’t help but think that it’s a little weird that if Steve hadn’t gone into the ice, he probably would have been his Uncle Steve, along with Aunt Peggy and the rest of the Commandos…

He’s standing now, excitedly saying, “Wait right here.”

Steve looks after him bewilderedly as Tony runs back to his bedroom. In his closet, there’s a box of some of his mother’s things that Tony had moved from the New York mansion when he moved into the tower. He rifles through it quickly, setting aside the two thick books, and then marches proudly back to the living room, his prizes in his arms.

“Here,” he says, dumping them on Steve’s lap.

“Tony, what-” But Steve stops as he opens the book and sees the first picture. It’s from Howard and Maria’s wedding. Obie’s in the picture too, one of the groomsmen, but Tony refuses to look at him and instead focuses on the other groomsmen.

“Aunt Peggy insisted that she be Howard’s best man,” Tony says. “Obadiah, my dad’s business partner- that’s him right there- wanted to be best man too so Aunt Peggy said she’d fight him for it. I’ll give you one guess who won.”

Steve chuckles and Tony ignores the fact that it sounds a little watery. “Uncle Dum Dum said _he_ should get to be the best man but I think he just wanted to irritate Aunt Peggy,” he continues. “He settled for being the runner up best man, like that’s a real position.”

“Obadiah didn’t fight him for that position?”

Tony gives him an aghast look. “Have you _seen_ Uncle Dum Dum?” he asks. “He wouldn’t have stood a chance.”

Steve looks closer at the last groomsman. “That’s Jarvis, isn’t it? Howard’s butler?” he asks. Tony nods silently, a small lump in his throat now. “I met him a few times. He seemed nice. Did you-”

“Name my AI after him? Yeah, I did,” Tony says casually. “He raised me more than Howard ever did. It seemed fitting.”

Steve doesn’t say anything about Howard’s lack of parenting, just turns the page. Tony doesn’t actually know the story behind these photos- a few pictures of the Commandos, Howard, and Maria at some sort of barbeque- but Steve doesn’t seem to mind. He just keeps flipping the pages. Falsworth stops showing up a few pages in and, when Steve asks, Tony tells him that he and Howard had some sort of falling out.

“I met him only once,” he says, “at Howard’s funeral. He stayed in touch with the rest of the Commandos.”

Another few pages and someone new starts showing up with Aunt Peggy. “That’s Uncle Danny,” Tony comments as casually as he can. The history books have always speculated that Peggy had been Steve’s soulmate and he doesn’t know what Steve knows about her life after Steve went into the ice.

“Sousa?” Steve asks and that answers Tony’s question. “Were they soulmates?”

Tony frowns. “I don’t know. Aunt Peggy never wanted to talk about it. You and her weren’t…?”

Steve laughs, a little bitterly. “No, Peggy wasn’t mine.”

It’s the way he says it that makes Tony think that Steve has already met- and lost- his soulmate. But he doesn’t want to ask. Not tonight when their friendship is so new and definitely not when they’re pouring over old memories.

The next pages go quickly- Peggy’s wedding, Gabe’s first kid- and then Steve pauses. He runs his fingers over Peggy’s face before trailing down to the baby in her arms. There’s a look of absolute adoration on Peggy’s face as she gazes down at the baby.

“Is this,” Steve begins hesitantly, “is this you?”

“Yeah,” Tony says quietly. “That’s my first picture.”

“Who took the picture?”

“Jarvis. I think I was two days old in that photo. Mom was recovering- it wasn’t an easy birth- and Howard was probably off drinking somewhere.”

Steve doesn’t take the bait, doesn’t ask why Howard was drinking instead of holding his son. It warms something in Tony’s heart.

They spend most of the rest of the night going through the two albums. When they’re finished, sometime around midnight, Steve goes to leave but Tony stops him. “You’re coming back anyway. Might as well stay. I’ve got a guest room up here.”

“That’s really nice of you but I can go. SHIELD’s got a room for me.”

“What?” Tony asks, incredulous. “No- what? You can’t be serious. You’re staying with SHIELD?”

Steve gives a small, embarrassed shrug. “I had an apartment in Brooklyn but it’s a pile of rubble now.”

“You can’t stay with SHIELD,” Tony says decisively. He sets off in the direction of the guest room. Steve makes another protesting sound but Tony keeps walking. Without further protest, Steve follows.

It’s like that for nearly a week. They wake up in the morning, work on the tower until lunch, break with the construction workers, and then work again until they stop sometime around dinner. Tony sends Happy out to the mansion to collect the rest of the photo albums. They spend two days going through those, even after Tony starts getting older and the albums start featuring him more as opposed to the Commandos. On the third day, Tony asks Steve what he’s caught up on. When Steve admits that he hasn’t actually caught up on anything, Tony sits him down in front of the TV and starts Star Trek.

It’s nice. When he’s not a walking pillar of judgment and self-righteousness, Steve is as wonderful as Aunt Peggy said he was. He’s got a sense of humor as dry as the Sahara and he can’t back down from a fight and he’s kind. God, he’s so kind. He offers to buy the meals for the construction workers because “Tony, it shouldn’t always be you” and he tips the baristas downstairs with everything in his pocket and, the one time they go out for a walk after dinner, he literally helps a little boy rescue his kitten from a tree.

And it scares Tony because he can feel himself falling hard and fast. They’ve only known each other for a few days but Tony has always loved too easily (he only needs to look at Ty and Obie for examples). It’s not like there’s any soulmate waiting for him out there, so what’s the harm?

But Steve is new to this century and he’s still grieving the loss of everything he’d ever known. Only a week ago, he’d hated Tony. They’re just barely becoming friends and Tony doesn’t want to mess this up. He _can’t_ mess this up because he can already tell that the Avengers are going to be the best thing that’s ever happened to him and he knows that if he messes this up with Steve, he’ll lose the Avengers. So he shoves his feelings way down and focuses on making Steve laugh.

Five days into their new routine, Bruce finally emerges from his lab in the middle of their Star Trek marathon. Tony knows he’s been eating and sleeping (he’d told JARVIS to keep an eye on him) but he’s been busy with some project. Tony hasn’t seen him since before Steve arrived and Steve hasn’t seen him at all.

Bruce takes one look at Steve and Tony eating burgers on the couch and remarks, “You two look… friendly.”

“Brucie-bear!” Tony exclaims, vaulting over the couch. He throws an arm around Bruce’s shoulders and leads him to one of the armchairs. “You’re just in time for Amok Time.”

“Tony won’t give me a straight answer,” Steve says. “Were Spock and Jim going steady?”

Bruce considers that for a moment. “Well…” he says thoughtfully.

“Shush,” Tony says. “You’ll spoil Amok Time.”

Bruce leans over and steals one of Tony’s fries. While he’s there, he whispers, “’Tony?’ Last time I saw you two, it was ‘Stark’ and ‘Rogers.’”

“You’ve missed a lot,” Tony whispers back.

The next morning, Bruce joins them for repairs. He doesn’t really make the work go any faster- Bruce’s talents definitely lie more towards academia- but the company is welcome. At one point, Steve asks him how much control he has over the Hulk, clearly wondering if they could use the Hulk for the renovations. When Bruce admits that he has very little control, Steve hums considering.

“We’ll have to work on that,” he says.

“You think you can?” Bruce asks incredulously.

“He took directions during the battle.”

“But those were simple instructions! The Hulk’s practically a mindless animal. You can’t command him like you would Tony-”

“Hey! I resent that,” Tony interrupts as he helps a couple of the workers lift a steel beam. “I refuse to take directions from Spangles here.”

The workers snicker at Tony’s new nickname for Steve. Over the last couple of days, Tony’s called Steve by his name exactly twice. Otherwise, it’s been a combination of “Cap,” “Capsicle,” and his latest: “Spangles.” Personally, Tony likes “Winghead” best because Steve tosses it right back at him with “Shellhead” which makes Tony feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

“Besides,” Tony continues, voice more serious, “I’ve seen the videos from Virginia and Harlem. I think the Hulk’s got a lot more control than you’re giving him credit for.”

One of the workers is nodding and Tony points at him. “You there. What’s your story?”

The man- Tony thinks his name is Daniel- looks a little surprised to be called out but he recovers quickly enough and says, “My wife, sir. One of the aliens flew into a billboard, brought it down on top of her. She’s claustrophobic but we couldn’t get to her. There were five of us trying to lift it, guess we just weren’t strong enough. The Hulk shows up out of nowhere, attacking a group of them aliens. Hears the screams, comes over, and we’re all thinking we’re gonna die. I mean, great big creature like that, who wouldn’t? But he just lifts the billboard up off my wife and goes back to beating up aliens.”

Bruce looks like he’s gonna cry. Hoping to divert attention from him, Tony asks, “Your wife okay?”

“She’s got a couple broken bones but she’s alive. We were lucky.”

“Where is she being treated?”

“Bellevue.”

“And her name is?”

Daniel frowns, clearly confused. “Nora Jenkins.”

Tony nods. “JARVIS? You up?”

“Always, sir,” JARVIS says. At this point, the workers aren’t startled by the AI but there’s still a look of awe on their faces. Tony can’t blame them. JARVIS is lightyears ahead of Siri.

“Can you make sure that the billing for Nora Jenkins at Bellevue gets sent to SI? Actually, do any of you guys have hospitals bills? Great. Tell J your names and we’ll take care of them.”

There’s a stunned silence when he finishes and he fidgets. “Unless… you want to pay the bills?” he asks, realizing that he might have overstepped. “I just thought, since hospital bills are a racket, I could offer-”

Daniel throws his arms around him, hugging him tightly. “Thank you, Mr. Stark,” he breathes, voice sounding a little wet. Daniel seems to have broken the dam and now everyone wants to shake his hand and thank him. Slightly uncomfortable, Tony steps away and directs them all to talk to JARVIS.

He ends up standing next to Steve. “That’s really nice of you, Tony,” Steve says quietly. There’s an odd look on his face and Tony fidgets again. He didn’t do it to get attention- or, well, he did but only because Bruce was looking even more uncomfortable with the attention on him.

“What’s the good of being a billionaire if I can’t give the money to people who actually need it?” he grumbles.

Steve is still looking at him with that weird smile on his face. Tony can’t help but want to escape to his workshop but he can’t do that because he promised that he’d help with the renovations. He does, however, make sure that every job he takes that day is on the opposite side of the tower from Steve. It means that he has to deal with the gratitude from the workmen but he’d rather deal with that than the soft look in Steve’s eyes.

Steve gets called to a meeting at SHIELD the next day, for which Tony is immensely grateful. Steve’s expression hasn’t changed and now Tony can’t stop squirming. He likes doing nice things but he’d prefer to do them anonymously; keeps up his reputation that way. But when he’d seen how Daniel’s story had affected Bruce and heard about Nora Jenkins… he couldn’t stop himself.

But that doesn’t mean he’s a good person. He’s done some pretty shitty things in his lifetime and flying a nuke through a wormhole and paying off a couple of hospital bills has only started to make a dent in the decades of warmongering. He’s got a long way to go to redemption.

Steve comes back spitting mad and trailing two superspies. The workmen have already left for the night and it’s just Tony and Bruce watching a movie on the couch. Barton and Romanoff sit down a little uneasily on one of the couches as Steve stalks into the kitchen. Tony gets up to follow him.

“Sorry, Tony,” Steve says as he throws a bag of popcorn in the microwave, his accent slipping into something more 1940’s Brooklyn. “I know I shouldda asked but you didn’t see how they were treatin’ Clint.”

“So tell me,” Tony replies, noting how Steve’s hands are shaking.

“Like he’s some kinda animal. They had him locked up and goin’ to face charges for what happened to the helicarrier when they _know_ that wasn’t his fault.”

Tony’s quiet for a long moment, long enough that Steve looks at him worriedly. “You’re not gonna send him back, are ya?” he asks.

Tony shakes his head. “Barton doesn’t deserve that. I’ll see what Pepper can do about the charges,” he promises. “And I’ll figure out where to stick Romanoff and Barton until we’re done with the renovations.”

* * *

It takes two weeks and a promise from Tony to weigh in on the designs for the new helicarrier but SI’s lawyers are indeed able to get Barton out of his court martial. Barton spends those two weeks moping around the tower with a haunted look in his eyes, jumping at shadows and flinching if anyone so much as speaks to him.

Tony can see why Steve wanted him out of SHIELD headquarters. SHIELD would have had too many loud noises and flashing lights. The first time one of the workmen drops a beam, it startles Barton so bad, he goes into a panic attack. Tony tells them all to go home while Romanoff works on calming Barton down.

For the rest of the two weeks, he gives the workmen paid leave until Fury shows up in person to tell Barton that he’s free to leave the state. Tony immediately suggests a team retreat to his Malibu home while the construction work is completed on the tower.

Steve thanks him and tells him that it’s a great idea. Romanoff snorts and mutters, “Of course _you_ think that’s a great idea,” which bewilders both Steve and Tony but it gets the first laugh out of Barton in two weeks so they leave it.

They’re in Malibu by that evening.

The team spends a month in California. Romanoff had visited back during the Vanko disaster but she seems to appreciate it a lot more now that she’s not there for a job. Most days, she drags Barton down to the beach though there’s quite a few days where it seems like neither of them are anywhere around. Not that Tony would know. He doesn’t ask JARVIS for their whereabouts.

Instead, he amuses himself by taking Steve to Disneyland (which Steve loves) and Knott’s Berry Farm (which he hates). Bruce is happy enough to putter around in one of SI’s labs in the city. Tony had offered him the use of the mansion’s workshop but Bruce had taken one look at the organized chaos that made up Tony’s workshop and firmly turned down the offer.

In the evenings, whoever’s at the mansion meets up for board games or a movie or sometimes just to talk. There’s rarely a night where everyone goes their separate ways. Barton seems to be on the mend and the team is bonding and things are going great. It works a lot better than Tony had expected when he’d made the offer.

They’ve been there for almost a month when Tony staggers up from a late-night workshop binge to find Romanoff in the kitchen, sipping on a cup of coffee. Tony checks the clock on the microwave- 2 am- and then hesitates. To be completely honest, he’s not sure he trusts her yet even though she certainly had his back during the Battle of New York (or so the news is calling it- with those capital letters too). But he recognizes that look in her eyes and, though he’s certainly no paragon of mental health, he doesn’t think that someone so young deserves to stare blankly into space at this hour.

He plops down in the chair across from her and asks, “Wanna talk about it?”

She startles (and doesn’t that say something, that he could actually manage to startle her?). She looks at him for a long moment and then says, “No.”

“Good,” Tony says flippantly. “’Cause I didn’t want to listen.”

That earns him a small smile.

“I’ll just talk at you instead,” he continues. “Nightmares, right?” Her head jerks and he takes that as an affirmative answer. “I don’t know what you see but I used to see the desert. I’m sure you’ve read my file. You know what happened there.” He doesn’t wait for her to respond though she seems to be listening now. “I still see the desert, I guess. But then about six weeks ago, I woke up because I was dreaming of the stars. You can’t imagine how lonely they are. Definitely not a great way to die. And Steve- the one night we fell asleep on the couch after Star Trek, I woke up because he was screaming about the ice. Bruce told me that he dreams about Culver University sometimes, when he can’t sleep either. It scares him what he might have done to a bunch of kids.”

Romanoff doesn’t say anything for a long time and Tony nods to himself before standing. He carefully places a hand on her shoulder. “Just wanted you to know you’re not alone, Natasha,” he says quietly.

He’s almost to the door when she says hoarsely, “Faces. I see faces.”

Tony gets that, he does. He bets that if he actually knew all the people his weapons have killed, he’d probably see their faces too. As it is, most nights Yinsen shows up in his dreams and on particularly bad nights, he sees the young soldiers killed in the ambush in Afghanistan.

“I don’t always know their names,” she says. “It scares me.”

Tony walks back and sits back down. Gently, he tugs the mug out of her hands so that he can take them between his. “You’re not a monster. No more than the rest of us are.”

She laughs hollowly. “You don’t know the things I’ve done.”

“And you don’t know how many villages my weapons destroyed, how many families they tore apart. Or how many children Steve killed who were just following orders. Or the homes Bruce smashed in Harlem. We’re all done terrible things; we’re just trying to make up for it.”

“Is that the best we can do? Try to make up for it?”

Tony shrugs. “That’s the best anyone can do.” He stands again. “Try to get some sleep.”

The next night, he wakes up thinking that he’s drowning again. He rolls to his side, worried that he might start retching- it’s not like it’s uncommon after one of these nightmares. It takes him a moment to realize that the knocking he’s hearing isn’t in his imagination.

“Come in,” he calls tightly.

The door opens and someone pads across the floor. Tony catches a glimpse of red hair in the light from the moon, then Romanoff- no, Natasha- lays down beside him, pressing her back against his. He starts to mumble out a sleepy question but she says, “Shh, Antoshka.” He’s not entirely certain why it works to comfort him but it does. He falls back asleep easily, his rest remaining dreamless.

* * *

It becomes a thing, even after the team moves back to New York. If one of them can’t sleep, they go and find the other one’s bed. It’s not sexual. Tony, for all his past conquests, has never wanted to fuck Natasha. It’s just comfort. Tony starts calling her Nat, the same way Barton does, thinking that he can’t exactly share a bed with someone and not trust them. They start doing more things together. It’s not the same as his friendship with Steve (nothing could be the same as his friendship with Steve) but it’s still nice.

They go shopping because, given her druthers, Nat would just as soon walk around in a holey t-shirt and ripped sweatpants as she would a ballgown and Tony, who grew up in three-piece suits, can’t stand that. Sometimes they go out to the movies. Barton joins them then, which leads to Tony discovering that Barton has a wicked sense of humor as he makes inappropriate jokes through even the most serious of dramas. He calls him Clint after that.

Steve catches Tony leaving Nat’s room a few days after they return to the tower. It’s early- a lot earlier than Tony had thought anyone would be up. They freeze, Tony in the doorway, Steve a little further down the hall. Steve doesn’t look disapproving exactly but there’s a twist to his mouth that Tony doesn’t like. He opens his mouth, intending on reassuring Steve that he’s not dating Nat though he doesn’t know why it matters that Steve knows that. Steve, however, just nods shortly and disappears into the kitchen.

They don’t talk for two days after that incident, the longest they’ve ever gone without talking since Steve moved into the tower. Tony’s sure that it has to do with Steve seeing him leaving Nat’s room but when he tries to talk to Steve about it, Steve just says, “Why would I be upset?” and then punches a punching bag so hard it flies across the room so Tony doesn’t quite believe him.

Nat calls him an idiot when he goes to her to complain but so do Bruce and Pepper so Tony thinks she’s probably right. He lets the stand-off between them sit for another day before deciding that Steve won’t make the next move and tracks him down.

He corners Steve in the kitchen and waves the tickets in his face. “We’re going to a Mets game and you’re going to like it,” Tony announces.

“Wouldn’t you rather take Natasha?” Steve blurts out.

Tony’s hand falls to his side. “Why would I take Nat? She hates baseball.”

“You two are… you know,” Steve says, waving his hands in a way that doesn’t clear things up at all.

“No, I don’t know,” Tony says, completely nonplussed.

“Dating,” Steve mumbles.

Tony stares at him for a long moment and then, before he can stop himself, bursts out laughing. “Me and _Natasha_? You actually think she’d give me the time of day?”

Steve crosses his arms defensively. “You don’t need to laugh. I saw you.”

“We’re not sleeping together,” Tony says. “It’s because we both have nightmares. Sometimes Clint joins us too.” That’s not wholly true. Clint’s only joined them once but Steve doesn’t need to know that.

“…Really?”

“Yeah but if you don’t believe me- J, call Nat for me?”

Nat picks up after a minute. “This had better be good,” she says waspishly. “You’re interrupting Parks and Rec.”

“I didn’t know you liked sitcoms- not the point. Did you know Steve thought we were dating?”

“What? No,” Nat drawled in a way that sounds like she definitely knew.

“Tell me, Nat darling, my favorite assassin, are we dating?”

“I’d rather date Fury.”

Tony winces. “No need to be so harsh.”

Nat hangs up rather than dignifying that with a response. Tony turns back to Steve with a self-satisfied smile, pleased that Nat had backed him up rather than teased Steve, to find him practically beaming.

“Tony, I’d love to go watch the Mets with you.”

* * *

It’s not long before Tony comes to the abrupt realization that he’s in love with Steve. He’s known for a while that he was falling for his captain but at some point, he’d gone from falling to fallen quite without realizing it.

Admittedly, it’s not some grand realization that comes when Steve saves his life from flying giraffe people (and Tony would love to see the world that those aliens came from) or when they’re at a ball game and the kiss cam lands on them and Steve laughs good-naturedly before leaning over and kissing Tony’s cheek. Rather, it comes quietly when Tony looks up from his work to see Steve dozing on the workshop couch, sketchbook and pencil neatly placed off to the side, and he thinks to himself, _God I love you_.

And then he panics.

It’s not that Tony thinks that Steve is perfection incarnate and that he can do so much better than Tony. Steve can definitely do better than Tony but he’s not perfect. He drinks the last of the coffee and doesn’t make a new pot. He swears like a sailor (or perhaps like a soldier). He can’t sing and he wakes up at absurd hours to go running and then tries to wake everyone else up too to go running with him.

No, Steve’s definitely not perfect.

But Tony’s got a defective soulmark and Steve still wears a band around his wrist to hide his mark from the world. Maybe his soulmate is dead and his mark is gone and Steve wears the band so that it’s not a reminder that he’s out of his time but maybe he’s still got a mark. Maybe he’s looking for his soulmate in this new century and it’s not Tony. It can’t be Tony because Tony is defective.

And so he sits there with this realization that he’s in love with Steve and the knowledge that he can’t say anything because Tony might be a dick but he’s not the kind of dick who would keep someone from their soulmate. He thinks about trying to pull away from the friendship (or codependency as Bruce calls it) but he’s done that before when Steve has pissed him off and all Steve has to do is give him puppy dog eyes and Tony caves like a sinkhole.

He’ll say nothing, he decides. He’ll say nothing and he’ll do nothing and, if he’s lucky, those feelings will go away.

* * *

The team, as much as it can be called a team when they’re missing a member, works surprisingly well.

They save the world once and then again. Tony flies another missile through another portal to save Miami from aliens- though this time the missile was planned and, frankly, Tony thinks that Miami is such a shithole anyway that it wouldn’t have mattered if the city had been destroyed.

He makes it back through the portal with plenty of time to spare but it doesn’t stop him from having nightmares for a week. They’re so bad Nat has to call first Clint and then Steve into the room to help hold him down so he doesn’t hurt himself.

Clint recovers from Loki’s mind control. It’s a slow process over the course of several months but he does recover- right up until a mutant calling himself Mesmero attempts to control Tony into turning on the team. It doesn’t work- the arc reactor stops it easily the same way it did Loki’s scepter and then Steve punches Mesmero hard enough to lose consciousness- but Clint spirals. It takes the combined efforts of several SHIELD agents, Nat, and Steve to pull him out of the ensuing panic attack. Clint comes to the team the next day to request time off.

“I can’t trust myself,” he says simply. “And I can’t learn to trust myself again when I’m running the risk of a setback every couple of weeks.”

Tony’s not sure but he thinks that Clint’s leave of absence is when the team starts to fall apart. Clint’s an asshole, sure, but he’s the loveable kind of asshole, the kind who goes out drinking with Tony but while Tony ends up back at the tower, Clint ends up in a dumpster somewhere. He pulls too many pranks sometimes but he’s also surprisingly good at pulling Tony out of his nightmares when Nat can’t. He goes to basketball games with Tony (since Steve hates everything about the sport) and always has some new pop culture reference that Steve just _has_ to watch to understand the last seventy years and he’s always willing to try whatever new recipe Bruce tried when the rest of the team wouldn’t go near it with a twenty-foot pole and, of course, there’s whatever he has going on with Nat.

The team feels lonelier without Clint there. They still have their movie nights and game nights and outings to whatever event Tony wants them at but it’s obviously not the same. Bruce starts doing humanitarian stuff again in the far corners of the globe. At first, it’s short trips that only last a few days but then they start lengthening into weeks until Bruce is more likely to be found out of the tower than in it.

With only three Avengers out of six, missions start going worse. They’re still successful but the missions take longer, the casualties rise, and the damage gets worse. The press starts coming down on them harder, which pushes Bruce further away, and the fissures between them all start compounding.

Tony starts taking stupid risks to end battles faster, which are effective but have the side effect of landing him in Medical more often than not. Steve starts yelling at him to stop being so damn stupid, which makes Tony resentful, and Nat clearly agrees with Steve though she says nothing, which makes Tony even more resentful. The end result is that Tony’s already thinking about moving back to Malibu by the time the Avengers come to a screeching halt.

They’ve spent six long hours battling acid-spewing snails attacking Brooklyn. Bruce, the only one who probably could have gone up against the snails with minimal damage, is, as usual, out of reach in Brazil and Clint is still on vacation so it’s just Tony, Nat, and Steve. The body armor that Nat and Steve wear and Tony’s own Iron Man armor is great but it’s not designed to withstand prolonged contact with acid. By the time they finally make it back to the tower and Steve herds them into the decontamination showers, the acid’s managed to mostly eat its way through the armor and is starting on their skin.

For months, Tony’s been meaning to make separate decontamination showers for men and women (and maybe one for people who identify as neither) but he hasn’t gotten around to it yet. This isn’t really a problem. Tony’s not interested in Nat like that and Steve’s too much of a gentleman to say anything but it does mean that she’s there when Steve takes off his band to scrub at the skin on his wrist.

“That your mark?” she asks curiously. Nat’s unmarked. Tony’s never asked if her soulmate is actually dead or if she has something similar to his own SKIN.

Reflexively, Tony glances over at Steve’s mark. He starts to glance away- soulmarks can be intensely private things after all and there has to be a reason Steve was hiding his- but then he freezes. He knows that mark. He knows it intimately well. His eyes trace over the red and gold phoenix rising from the bright blue flames on Steve’s wrist.

It’s Tony’s mark.

He doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Steve’s his _soulmate_. He’s spent this entire time worrying about whether any romantic gestures he made would be keeping Steve from his soulmate and it doesn’t matter because Steve is already _his_.

“Have you found them yet?” she asks, her voice just a little too casual. Tony looks up from where he’s tapping at his wrist, absently wondering if he should tell Steve now or wait until they’re alone. Yep, she’s looking directly at him. He’s not sure how she found out about his mark but she is a master spy. He’s not terribly surprised that she knows.

She jerks her head at Steve. Tony can read her nonverbal message, clear as day. She wants him to tell Steve. No one ignores a direct order from Nat so he opens his mouth, still not sure what he’s going to say but then-

“Yes,” Steve says, looking down at his mark. He runs his thumb over it slowly.

Nat and Tony both freeze this time.

“Who?” Tony asks. He thinks he can be forgiven for his voice sounding a little strangled. He thought he’d been careful but to find out that at least two people (and probably also Fury if he’s being honest) other than Rhodey and Pepper know his secret is a disconcerting. Then Steve swallows thickly and his eyes start glistening. Tony has the sudden feeling that he’s not going to like what Steve has to say.

“Um, Bucky was,” Steve says quietly.

Oh.

* * *

Tony’s sitting alone in his room. He’s been there for the last four hours, eyes glued to his mark to see if it disappears. Every time he blinks, he immediately asks JARVIS if it flickered while he was blinking. Each time, JARVIS tells him that it hasn’t.

It’s the longest it’s gone without disappearing since Tony was a toddler.

He doesn’t know for certain when it stopped flickering since he hasn’t taken the SKIN off for longer than a few minutes in years but he strongly suspects that it’s around the time that Steve was found in the ice.

Not that it matters. Steve Rogers might be Tony’s soulmate but Tony isn’t Steve’s.

Tony knows about Bucky. Bucky Barnes, just like Steve, had appeared in Aunt Peggy’s stories and in the history books and the Smithsonian exhibit. Tony had already known all about Bucky and then, of course, Steve had shared his own stories about his best friend. He’d never once said that Bucky had been his soulmate but then, Tony supposed that that sort of grief was extremely private.

He doesn’t know why Steve’s soulmark was still visible on his wrist when, by all accounts, marks are supposed to disappear when a person’s mate dies. But then again, Tony has spent more than forty years with a defective mark. He wouldn’t be terribly surprised to learn that Steve also has a defective mark. For that matter, Steve’s mark might not be a mark at all. It isn’t uncommon for people whose soulmate has died to get a tattoo of their mark in remembrance of their partner.

Tony puts the SKIN back on his wrist and smooths it down. He doesn’t know why he’s still thinking about this. He can stare at his wrist all day long and it won’t change the fact that he’s not Steve’s soulmate.

He flops backward onto the bed. “I don’t think I can do this, J,” he admits. “I don’t think I can be around him and not tell him.”

JARVIS is quiet for a moment. “Sir,” he says finally. “Miss Potts would like to know if you’ll be in Malibu for the board meeting tomorrow afternoon.”

Tony’s usual answer is a flat refusal but this time, he listens to what JARVIS isn’t saying instead of what he is. He stands and pulls his shirt cuffs down over his wrists. “Tell her I’ll be there by tomorrow morning.”


	2. Flying Right Past the Ones who Said No

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Steve finds his soulmate at a young age, becomes Captain America, loses his soulmate, falls in love with Tony Stark, and destroys a government organization.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the response to this fic! I wasn't expecting such an outpouring of support and I'm so delighted by it :)
> 
> Now for the fun part: I still don't have an updating schedule. Sorry about that.
> 
> !!!!!WARNING FOR THIS CHAPTER!!!!! Steve says some dickish things to Tony as a result of him having an awful day. It's not an excuse (other than I needed to get Tony to California and this seemed like it would work) so if you don't want to read about Steve being a jerk, skip the part beginning with "I'm resigning from the Avengers and ending with "He left me."

Steve Rogers is born with a soulmark.

This, of course, isn’t unusual in the slightest. Everyone is born with a soulmark. Steve’s mother has a bluebird on her wrist and his father had a broken compass, or so he’s been told.

What is unusual is that, when Steve is injected with the serum, his soulmark changes. Soulmarks aren’t supposed to change. They’re supposed to remain static, as static as the fact that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.

But Steve’s mark does change. He was born with one mark and when he finally gets the chance to look at himself after the serum, after Erskine’s death, after Phillips’ rejection, he notices that his mark has changed. He’s probably supposed to log the change- everything else had been recorded- but Steve has always been intensely private. The band around his wrist has been worn since the day he was born. He’s not going to change that now.

But that comes later.

* * *

Steve is born with a robin in flight on his wrist.

His mother calls it pretty. Steve doesn’t know what his dad thinks about it because his dad is long gone by the time Steve is born. Like his mother, Steve thinks his mark is pretty too. That doesn’t stop him from wearing a band around his wrist though. To him, soulmarks are meant to be private, something to be shown to one’s lover to determine if they truly are deeply compatible. He knows that maybe he’ll pass his soulmate by and they won’t know because his mark is covered but Steve has a feeling that it won’t be a problem.

When he’s six and can scarcely breathe through the coughing, he asks his mother, “What’ll happen to my soulmate if I die before they can meet me?”

She smiles sadly and strokes his hair. “You will, sweetheart. Everyone is destined to meet their soulmate.”

He’s leaning up against her chest because it helps with the breathing a little. Twisting his head up to look at her, he asks, “Have you?”

Her smile turns brittle around the edges and she eases out from behind him. “I’ll make you some soup,” she promises before leaving.

That night, Steve’s coughing fits get so bad they wake him up. Usually, his mother rushes in to wake him up herself before the coughs get to this stage but she’s nowhere to be seen tonight. As Steve sits himself up and lets his coughing settle on its own, he can hear the reason why.

She’s crying. Steve has never heard his mother cry before. She’s always been strong and unflappable. He doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know how to comfort her. Instinctively, he knows that her tears have something to do with his question about her soulmate but without knowing what it was exactly that upset her, he can’t do anything about it.

He resolves to ask her in the morning so that he knows never to do it again and falls back asleep.

In the morning, his fever has spiked and he’s delirious with pain. His resolve to talk to her slips away with the memory of the night. His mother changes out the cool washcloth on his forehead and murmurs again about how he’s going to live to meet his soulmate.

When he’s a little older, he realizes that there’s no scientific basis behind her words. It’s an old wives’ tale, this idea that everyone is destined to meet their soulmate. Everyone has a soulmate but not everyone meets theirs.

Not that it matters for Steve because when Steve is eight, he meets Bucky.

* * *

It’s almost a fluke that Bucky (who is still going by James at the time and will be for another year until there are three other James in their class) even sees his mark. It’s not the first time they’ve met but all the other times, James has shown up at whatever fight Steve’s gotten himself into and then disappeared right after. The first time, Steve has to yell after him to tell him his name. James introduces himself the next time as he’s running back down the alley but he’s still running away.

This time though Steve takes a hard tumble to the ground as the bullies are running off and James hesitates just long enough for him to yell, “Wait!” James stops though he’s eying Steve like he’s some sort of venomous snake.

“Just wanted to thank you,” he mutters. “Even if I did have ‘em on the ropes.”

James laughs. “Sure ya did.” He reaches down to help pull Steve up from the ground. It’s fine at first until Steve is trying to get his feet under him and then all of his weight is on his wrist and James is pulling on it and it _hurts_. Steve yells and falls back, cradling his wrist.

“Let me see,” James demands as he kneels beside him.

Steve wants to tell him no, wants to say that his mother’s a nurse and she can look at it, but he doesn’t. He lets James pull his band off, biting back another pained yelp, and check over his wrist. James looks at the back first, twists it around to make sure it’s not broken. Steve tells him that it hurts but it does bend so it’s probably just bruised. Even so, he still doesn’t complain as James turns it over to check the inner part of his wrist.

Except James doesn’t check anything.

He turns his wrist over, chattering about science class probably to distract Steve, and then falls silent. Steve looks down at where James is staring to see the robin in flight. It looks a little swollen and he absently notes that that’s probably from a bruise forming.

Then James says, “You’re my soulmate.” He sounds so awed that Steve can’t help but snap his attention back to him. No one’s ever sounded like that around him. Steve didn’t even think that they could.

“Huh?” he asks intelligently.

“You’ve got my mark,” James says impatiently and scrambles for his own band. He yanks it off, then shows Steve his bare wrist. Sure enough, his mark is the spitting image of Steve’s own, all the way down to the tiniest feather.

Steve swallows hard, looking back up at James. “You’re my soulmate,” he says dumbfoundedly.

James grins and though he’s only eight, Steve thinks it’s the most gorgeous thing he’s ever seen. “I already said that,” he points out.

“Yeah but-” Steve stammers out. “You’re my _soulmate_.”

Their conversation dissolves into chaos after that. They’re laughing and maybe even crying a little because it’s so rare to find a soulmate this early in life and Steve can’t quite believe that he’s going to be allowed to have this. Over the last year, he had grown to believe that he was probably going to die before he met his soulmate but instead, he’s got James, his perfect match.

Steve wants to take James home to meet his mother. James wants to take Steve home to meet his parents. Their laughter devolves into a near-argument as they talk over each other for why their family should be the first to meet their soulmate. Steve thinks wryly that James is definitely his soulmate. Who else would be able to keep up with his arguing?

James throws him a sly smile. “Tell you what. We’ll arm wrestle for it.”

Steve’s jaw drops. “That’s not fair,” he protests. Just because he hates admitting it doesn’t mean that he doesn’t know that he’s weaker than the other boys (and most of the girls) in his grade.

“Not my problem,” James retorts with a casual shrug. “You forfeit then?”

Steve sighs. “You don’t leave me much of a choice.” He trudges after James, consoling himself with the thought that they’ll probably end up having dinner with his mother and not James’ family since they’re meeting her last.

As it turns out, they live in the same apartment building. They compromise by inviting the entire Barnes family to dinner at Steve’s.

* * *

Steve is twenty and Bucky (who’s been going by Bucky for over ten years now) invites him over for dinner. This isn’t unusual for them. Since the boys turned eleven, they’ve spent most nights at each other’s home, only heading back to their own home when it was time for bed. Even after the Barnes family moved to a different building a few streets over, they kept it up.

It’s not even unusual that Bucky meets him outside his building, wraps his pinky around Steve’s- neither of them are particularly public in their affections- and leads him away. Bucky’s family can be loud at the best of times and deafening at the worst. Sometimes, Steve doesn’t mind that but sometimes, he just wants quiet. He wouldn’t have minded the noise tonight what with his own apartment seeming far too quiet these days but it seems as though Bucky wants some quiet instead.

What’s more unusual is how Bucky doesn’t lead them to one of their diners or to the park for a picnic. Instead he leads them a few blocks over and stops in front of an apartment building Steve has never seen before.

“Buck, where are we?” he asks.

“You’ll see,” he says cryptically. Steve kind of hates it when Bucky gets like this, all mysterious and the like. There’s always a surprise waiting for him at the end of it and it’s always a surprise that Steve will like (with the notable exception of that time with the goat) but it’s the part where Bucky lords his secret over him that Steve hates.

Bucky isn’t trying to look superior this time though. He looks- nervous, almost. He leads Steve inside and up two flights of stairs before stopping in front of an unmarked door.

For a heart-stopping moment, Steve wonders if this is it. If this will be the moment where Bucky tells him that he’s sorry but Steve and his myriad of illnesses are too much for him to handle and he’s gone off and found someone else. It’s uncommon but not unheard of for soulmates to reject each other and Steve is sure that if anyone were to be rejected by their soulmate, it would be him.

But then Bucky doesn’t actually knock. Instead, he pulls out a key and unlocks the door, ushering Steve inside first. The place is already well-lit so Steve can see the familiar grandfather clock in the entry hall- the one that Bucky’s uncle gave him for his birthday last year- and the afghan that Steve’s mother had knitted for Bucky three years ago draped across the couch.

“I moved in yesterday,” Bucky says.

Steve nods absently. “I can see that,” he murmurs as he walks around. It’s a nice place, open and airy. Steve bets that the morning light would be just perfect and it overlooks a busy street, the kind that gets Steve itching for his sketchbook.

But it’s missing some things, things that are kind of necessary. Like there’s a dining table but no chairs and a sofa in the living room but no lamps. Steve can’t help but think that the standing lamp he’s got in his own living room would go perfect in the far corner. But it’s the bedroom that’s the oddest.

He walks back out of the room. Bucky’s laying out plates on the table and Steve wonders if Bucky had already cooked before going to meet him.

“Where are you sleeping?” he asks.

Bucky shrugs. “Couch for now.”

“Uh huh,” Steve agrees dubiously. “And what’s wrong with your bed? Why didn’t it come with you?”

Bucky keeps his eyes trained on the table as he says, “Yours is bigger.”

Steve freezes. Bucky looks up at him and gives him what’s probably supposed to be a cocky smirk but comes off as terrified. “Come on, Stevie. Don’t ya think it’s time we moved in together?”

Steve’s answer is to drop to his knees and open Bucky's pants.

* * *

Dr. Erskine lets him keep the band on his wrist during the procedure. It, of course, doesn’t grow with the rest of his body but Steve doesn’t realize that it’s cutting off circulation to his wrist until after the adrenaline rush wears off.

He’s in an SSR medical examination room. The nurse is finishing up taking his pulse. These tests have always made his fingers tingle so Steve isn’t surprised when he can’t feel them during the test but then feeling doesn’t return. He glances down at his wrist to see the band digging into the skin around his wrist.

“Huh,” he says and attempts to work it down over his hand. He can’t. He’s grown too much to just slide the band off.

Peggy enters the room with a stack of clothes. “You got a knife?” he asks distractedly, still trying to slide the band off.

“Of course,” she replies and hands him her pocket knife.

Steve sighs a little mournfully. Bucky had given him this band the night he’d shipped out. It’ll be a shame to ruin it. But the band has to come off so he starts cutting. He slips a few times and cuts himself but the serum in his veins heals him within seconds. He finally manages to cut through the band. It slithers off his wrist and falls to the floor unnoticed as he stares, in horror, at his mark.

It’s changed.

Gone is the robin in flight that matches Bucky’s so perfectly. In its place is a red and gold phoenix rising from a flame so blue it nearly makes his eyes hurt. It’s visually stunning; honestly, it might be the most beautiful mark he’s has ever seen.

He hates it.

He hates that he hadn’t taken his band off to look at his mark one last time before the procedure. He hates that the robin is gone, that that wonderful trace of _Bucky_ is gone.

“What’s wrong?” Peggy asks gently.

Peggy’s never seen his mark. Steve and Bucky have always been very private about their marks, only removing their bands when they were alone together. Part of him wants to tell her. They’ve become friends- or not quite friends but certainly something- over the course of Steve’s basic training, ever since the day with the flagpole. He thinks she’d understand. But another part, a much larger part, thinks that she’d urge him to report it if she knew that it had changed or even report it herself. He’s supposed to share all major changes with them but this _thing_ going on with his mark- he can’t share that. He’s never heard of anyone’s mark changing before. He’s a little afraid of ending up in a lab, never to see the light of day again, if he tells her.

“Guess I kind of miss the little guy from Brooklyn,” he quips instead.

* * *

At first, Steve tries to avoid showing him but Bucky’s always known Steve better than he knows himself. He clearly knows that something is wrong, especially after Steve refuses to take his band off when they’re in private.

The first night they’re in London after they return from Azzano, Steve finally takes his band off and shows him. Bucky stares at it for a long time before reaching out a shaky finger to trace over the lines of the mark.

“I thought the war couldn’t take anything else from me,” he whispers.

Steve is sure that he isn’t meant to hear that, positive that if it had been before the serum he wouldn’t have, but it’s so heartbreaking that he can’t stop himself from saying, “You’re still my soulmate.”

“Course I am,” Bucky says and gives him that old cocky smirk but there’s something missing in his eyes.

There’s something hesitant in their interactions after that, something that’s never been there before. Bucky tries to pretend that Steve’s new mark doesn’t bother him but Steve knows him. He knows that it’s bothering him. Bucky isn’t sure of Steve anymore and, what’s worse, is Steve isn’t entirely sure of Bucky.

The night that he puts together his team, the night that Peggy comes to the bar in a gorgeous red dress and flirts with him and Bucky stares her down with hard eyes until she leaves, Steve presses Bucky down into the mattress and holds him there while he presses kisses over his body. He fucks into him with slow, sure strokes, whispering over and over, “You’ll always be my soulmate. You're mine, Bucky Barnes.”

He doesn’t tell him the rest of it- that, while Bucky is still his soulmate, Steve’s pretty sure that someone else belongs to him now too.

* * *

Steve wants to say that things get better but they don’t. Bucky’s eyes keep lingering on his mark, even though it’s covered up by a new band (one that Bucky didn’t choose), and he’s pulling away from Steve and there’s nothing Steve can do about it because there’s a war going on. He can’t give Bucky the attention, the _devotion_ , that he deserves right now.

He promises himself that after the war is over, after they’ve gone home, he’ll convince Bucky again of how much he loves him. If it takes him the rest of their lives, he’ll convince Bucky that he’s enough for him.

* * *

And then Bucky falls.

* * *

And then Steve falls.

As the plane crashes and the water starts rushing in, he thinks of what his mother had told him- that everyone is destined to meet their soulmate. He knows by now that it's an old wives’ tale. Still, he can't help thinking that maybe there's some truth to it.

It doesn't matter that his mark has changed. He met his soulmate and he was wonderful and they had eighteen perfect years together.

He's met his soulmate. Nothing else matters.

* * *

Steve has badly, _badly_ misjudged Tony Stark.

Admittedly, he'd known the moment Tony had let himself get run over by a giant fan when Steve couldn't reach the lever during Loki's attack that he'd misjudged him. And then Tony flew a missile into a wormhole. And then he offered the Avengers a place to live. And then he told Steve stories about the Commandos. And then he sent his own lawyers to fight against Clint's court martial. And then-

Yeah, he'd misjudged him.

They've been back in New York from their vacation in California for two days when a reporter corners Steve and Tony outside an Einstein Bros. Bagels, picking up breakfast for the team. Tony's exhausted; at this point, Steve's pretty sure he's been up for over a day working on stretchy pants for Bruce. He's wearing sweatpants and a tank top and his hair is fluffy, long since freed from the gel that normally keeps it flat. All told, he's a far cry from the usual picture-perfect image he presents for the press.

So Steve feels perfectly justified in glaring at the pretty blonde reporter who steps in front of the door to block them from entering.

"Hello, Christine," Tony says wearily.

She smiles and there's something almost wolfish about it. Steve doesn't like her. "Hi, Tony," she replies. "I just have a couple quick questions."

The Avengers haven't really done any press yet. There'd been a couple statements released right after the Battle of New York but no interviews, nothing like the USO tours Steve had done, and certainly no press conferences. With Thor off world, Bruce's anger issues, and Nat and Clint's constant hypervigilance, Steve and Tony had both decided that press was probably a bad idea.

That being said, he does know that someone is handling their press. Tony's got something called a social media team taking care of their image and SI's legal department takes care of the press after their battles (they haven't had very many of those- just Loki and then a few small villains).

This is the first time they've actually come up against a reporter and clearly one who has a personal history with Tony if the way she's looking at him is any indication. Her mouth twists like Tony is something distasteful she has to deal with.

Steve doesn't like that. Tony's great. He gave the Avengers a home and he fights side by side with them and he's funny and so damn brilliant it scares Steve sometimes.

He moves slightly so that he's half blocking Tony from her view. "Anything you have to ask, you can ask me," he says firmly.

Tony opens his mouth, probably to protest, but Christine whirls on him so fast that Steve can't help but wonder if that was her plan all along.

"It was a shock to see you fighting in the Battle of New York," she says. "People are saying that you somehow survived your time in the ice. How did that happen?"

Steve wonders who those people are. He knows perfectly well that the released press statement acknowledged that he was indeed the original Captain America and that the serum was what allowed him to survive. He has a sneaking suspicion that she's fishing for the formula to the serum.

His eyes narrow. "There's already been a released statement about that, ma'am," he says evenly.

"How long had you been awake by the time Loki attacked?"

"Ten months."

"And you never thought to announce your survival before then?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I'd just awoken to find that I'd lost seventy years, that nearly everyone I knew was dead, that the world had changed. You don't think I deserved some time to find where I fit in to this new century?"

"Don't you think that the people of this century deserved to know that a great hero was protecting their country?"

Steve gestures at Tony. "They already had a great hero protecting this country."

Tony makes a small noise as Christine scoffs. "Tony Stark?" she asks incredulously but there's a victorious gleam in her eyes like this is exactly the topic she wanted to land on. "Do you even know the things he's done?"

"I think I know a lot more than you do about the things Tony's done. He's made mistakes, yes, but so have I."

"I doubt you've done anything along the lines of what-"

Steve has tried very hard to be patient with her but she's being cruel for the sake of being cruel. There's no reason for her to be pointing out the things that Tony's trying to make up for, has _already_ made up for. He's never stood for anyone insulting his team and he's not going to start allowing it now.

"Ma'am, my closest friend is dead because of things that I've done," he says. It hurts a little to call Bucky a friend when he'd been so much more than that but Steve knows what's being said about him and Bucky these days. The world doesn't have any idea what Bucky meant to him and Steve isn't about to tell them now when he knows that they'll focus on that instead of what he wants them to focus on.

"Tony's never done anything like that," he continues. She starts to say something but Steve pushes on. "You want a statement? Here's a statement for you: I've been in this century for over a year and the best thing about it is Tony Stark. Everything good about this century can be found in Tony- the innovation, the creativity, the curiosity pushing discovery. He's more than made up for his past mistakes. I'm proud to call him my friend and an integral part of my team.

"Excuse me," he finishes and pushes past her. He opens the door and ushers Tony inside. Tony's gaping at him and Steve can't help but congratulate himself for rendering him speechless.

"Steve, what did you do?" Tony finally squeaks. He pulls out his phone and begins furiously typing. "Oh god, I've got to warn Pepper. You can't just say things like that. People will think you mean them."

Steve frowns. "Tony," he says and gently lifts Tony's chin so he can look him in the eyes. "I did mean them."

"I- but why?"

"You gave me a home, Shellhead. You befriended Natasha after she spied on you. You helped Clint when you didn't even know him. Why wouldn't I?"

Tony glances away almost desperately. "You know what they'll be saying about us, right? They'll say that we're soulmates. At the very least, we'll be dating. Do you really want to be mixed up in that?"

"I don't care," Steve insists. "I meant every word I said. You're my best friend. No one, least of all you, deserves to feel the way she was trying to make you feel."

Steve knows that the media storm about this is going to be a mess (and god he hates the way the press has been allowed to invade every part of people's lives). He knows that their teammates are going to tease them endlessly for this. He knows that people are going to be speculating about his words for months to come. But he can't bring himself to care because Tony's giving him this tiny, delighted smile and he thinks that he'd do anything to keep Tony smiling at him like that.

And then he thinks, _Fuck_.

* * *

It's not love. Not yet, anyway. But Steve can already see it going that way. Tony's all of the things that he's already mentioned and gorgeous as well. Yes, he can be a little bit narcissistic sometimes and so damn reckless that Steve wants to shake him until he develops a sense of self-preservation but it's always because he sees a way to save more lives- and who can fault him for doing that? It wouldn't be hard to fall in love with him at all.

Steve thinks about his changed soulmark. It's still on his arm and he's not entirely certain what that means, whether his other soulmate was alive back in the 40s and is now old or if they've belonged to this century all along and the universe knew somehow that he'd end up here. He thinks that if they were alive in the 40s then they deserve to be left alone. He hopes that they lived a fulfilling life. It would just be cruel of him to barge in now at the end of it.

If they belong to the new century though...

Steve's looked into how people find their soulmates now. Back in the 40s, people just sort of hoped for the best and went around with their arms uncovered. People like Steve, who wore a band on their wrist, were few. But the internet changed all that. Now there's a registry where people can post pictures of their mark and list distinguishing features if they want. Celebrities do interviews where they show off their mark in the hopes of their soulmate seeing it and contacting them. A lot of the very high-profile celebrities- like Tony used to- wear bands specifically to stop people from trying to fake a match with a tattoo. If Steve wants to, he can easily find his soulmate.

But he doesn't really want to.

He had Bucky and it was everything he'd ever hoped for. To ask for anything else seems selfish to him, especially when he suspects that the life of a superhero's soulmate would be exceedingly dangerous. There's no doubt in his mind that his soulmate would be a target for any villain out there. He refuses to put someone through that kind of danger.

Tony, though- Tony's markless. It's awful that Tony's soulmate is dead but Steve can't help but feel a little grateful. He doesn't want to take anyone away from their soulmate- everyone deserves to feel as loved as he once did.

He's not ready to make a move yet though. Not until he's sure of both his own feelings towards Tony and Tony's feelings towards him. If he makes a move and it turns out that Tony doesn't feel any sort of attraction toward him- well, that's the kind of thing that could tear their team apart.

* * *

The predicted media storm doesn't hit at all. Tony goes looking to find out why and reports back that Pepper threatened to sue Vanity Fair for all they're worth if Christine's interview got out. Tony's perfectly happy with that answer. Steve, on the other hand, digs a little deeper than that- because simply backing down doesn't match what he's learned about the press in this century at all- and learns that Christine wasn't even supposed to be talking to them in the first place, that Fury had called in a considerable amount of favors to ensure that the Avengers were protected from that sort of impromptu media attention.

Steve sends a gift basket to Fury's desk.

Supposedly, Fury thought it was a bomb and threw it out a window which is just about the funniest thing Steve's ever heard.

* * *

Life goes on.

The Avengers save the world a few times over the next year, stop a few minor villains. Clint steps away from the team, then Bruce, and then it's just Nat, Tony, and Steve. It's clear that the team is starting to fall apart but Steve's still doing everything he can to hold them together.

It doesn't help that Tony keeps taking unnecessary risks during battles. Once, his risks had a point to them- to save lives- but now it just seems like he's doing them to end their fights quicker. Steve wouldn't mind this except Tony's taking these risks without any regard to his own personal safety, which has him ending up in medical more often than not.

By now, Steve can admit that he's well on way to falling in love with Tony and maybe that's what makes him react more harshly when Tony gets hurt. He shouldn't yell, he knows that, but every time he tries to calm himself down, he sees Tony dropping from the sky again and he can't help it.

He remembers what he told Tony when he invited him to join the Avengers- that they would work together on his risk-taking. He still wants to but how can he be expected to help when Tony won't make the effort?

* * *

The anniversary of Steve going into the ice begins with acid-spewing snails attacking Brooklyn at six in the morning, which means it's already not a good morning but then Tony accidentally throws a truck at him and sends him flying into the East River. It's October so the water isn't as cold as it could be but the association is still not great. He climbs out of the river, gives himself a few minutes to calm down his impending flashback, and then runs back into the fight.

The anniversary of Steve going into the ice continues with Natasha asking him about his mark. Maybe on any other day, he would have told them the whole story, about growing up with Bucky and his changed soulmark and how he's decided not to try and find his new soulmate. Maybe he would have finished by asking Tony out. Instead, he tells them that he's already found his soulmate and, when Tony asks who it is, Steve tells them it was Bucky. They're reacting oddly- Natasha's voice is too casual and Tony looks devastated- but it's already been a long day so Steve thinks he can be forgiven for ignoring their reactions and leaving.

The anniversary of Steve going into the ice ends with Tony finding him in the kitchen and saying, "I'm going back to Malibu."

He doesn't look up from the soup he's stirring. Tony goes on business trips every once in a while, all part and parcel of his job as the head of SI's R&D department. "When will you be back?" he asks absently, already wondering if he can somehow contact Bruce to come back so they don't have to call Tony back from his trip for an assemble.

"I'm not coming back."

Steve looks up then. "What?"

"I'm resigning from the Avengers."

" _What?_ "

Tony looks uncomfortable though there's still that quiet devastation lurking beneath the discomfort. "I'm quitting," he repeats.

"You can't _quit_. Tony, the team needs you," he implores. _I need you_ , he thinks.

Tony openly scoffs at his words. "What team? Thor's been off world for over a year. Bruce is out of contact. Clint is on indefinite vacation."

"Clint's coming back-"

"When?" Tony demands. "Steve, he's been gone for nine months. I don't think he's coming back. Face it, we don't have a team. We haven't had one in months."

Steve feels like the rug's been ripped out from under him. Tony's never mentioned these doubts before. This whole time, Steve's been thinking that he was happy- that _they_ were happy. To find out that Tony, his best friend, is planning on leaving is crushing.

"We can recruit," he says desperately, trying to find a reason to keep Tony here with him.

"Recruit who? There’re no news stories about mysterious vigilantes or aliens in Kansas. We're it. We're the only superheroes in the world," Tony says and there's a cruel note to his words.

Steve can feel the anger swelling inside him but he fights to keep his voice steady as he asks, "Can I at least know why you're leaving?"

Tony shrugs insolently. "SI's not putting out enough products. Can't focus on that and the Avengers. Figured I'd jump ship before it sinks."

He's lying. Steve knows he's lying but Tony's got his public mask on and Steve can't see through that so he doesn't know what he's hiding. The fury gets stronger and he's trying to fight it down though it's threatening to break free.

"The world needs us," he says through gritted teeth.

"The world didn't used to," Tony retorts. "They'll get used to not having us around again."

"So- what? You're just gonna hang up the Iron Man suits, run back to your company? Tell Miss Potts she's done playing at being CEO, take it over again?" he snaps and he needs to stop before he says something he regrets.

"Don't you dare say anything about Pepper," Tony threatens but Steve's not done.

"Maybe you'll even start making weapons again since being a superhero isn't fun anymore." And this is the moment, Steve can feel it, where he throws their entire friendship away but the words are coming faster than he can even think to stop them. "You're nothing but a cowardly businessman, pretending to care about the world. God, I can't believe I ever thought you were a hero."

Tony rears back like Steve had slapped him. His eyes are bright and shining. There's a tremble in his lower lip, so slight that Steve nearly misses it. His anger drains away, leaving shock and horror at the awful, _terrible_ things he's just said.

"I guess that's that then," Tony says softly.

"Tony, wait!" Steve blurts out but Tony's already gone. He should go after him- he has to apologize- but he can't bring himself to move.

He's still standing there when Natasha finds him thirty minutes later. She slaps him across the face. Steve takes that to mean that she already saw Tony. "How dare you?" she hisses.

Steve could ask her the same thing. He's seen the file she put together about Tony; he's sure that it at least some of Tony's issues about being a superhero stem from that file. He doesn't say any of that though. His mouth has done enough damage for one night. Instead-

"He left me," he says helplessly.

Natasha's anger seems to melt away. Slowly, she reaches up to pull him down into a hug. "Yeah, he did," she murmurs. She doesn't sound surprised. He kind of wants to ask her about that but he doesn't think now's the time.

* * *

Over the next week, Steve tries nearly a hundred times to reach Tony but he never picks up. Eventually, he thinks to try flying out to Malibu and apologizing in person. After all, if he were in Tony's place, he'd want an in-person apology.

He gets as far as the front door of Tony's mansion. It swings open before Steve can knock, revealing War Machine leveling a repulsor at him. Steve had met Tony's best friend, Jim Rhodes, this past Christmas. At the time, they'd gotten along just fine but he remembers thinking that Rhodes would be a man he'd never want to cross. He looks at him now and knows that he's crossed him.

"Turn around, Captain," Rhodes threatens. He hears the familiar whine of the repulsor powering up.

He turns around.

* * *

"Fury wants us in D.C."

Steve glances up at Natasha's words. It's the beginning of December. Tony hasn't spoken to him in over a month. Natasha, he knows, has flown out to Malibu a couple of times. She tells him that Tony's doing okay, that he asks if Bruce has emerged from wherever he's hiding now, if Clint has come back from leave. He doesn't ask if Tony's asked after him.

"What for?" he asks.

"Mission debrief," she says flatly. "Couple of Chitauri weapons emerged in the hands of a group of drug dealers in Quebec. He wants us to go in undercover, find the weapons, get them back."

Christmas Eve finds them in a dive bar in Quebec. Their original debrief had stated that the weapons had fallen into the hands of a few petty drug dealers but these men aren't petty in the slightest. These are hardened criminals, all on SHIELD's watchlist and many multiple offenders. It makes Steve's skin crawl to look around and realize that all of these men have innocent blood on their hands.

It's a far cry from last Christmas when the team had still been together and celebrated at the tower.

Natasha's at the bar, interrogating the bartender. Steve himself is chatting up a group of men playing pool, letting them fleece him out of a few dollars. He's got a large bag at his feet. The men think it's full of cocaine; it's actually hiding the shield. The television in the corner is playing some sort of breaking news story but Steve isn't really paying attention. He lines up his next shot, letting the noises of the bar go in one ear and out the other.

"-gone missing, presumed dead. Stark's mansion was attacked by the Mandarin earlier this afternoon-"

Steve's cue rips a hole in the tablecloth. He stands and whips around, all focus now on the TV. The room's gone silent. Everyone's staring at the news report as footage of Tony's Malibu mansion sliding into the ocean plays.

Oh god, _Tony_. Steve can't move, can hardly manage to breathe. He'd done this. He'd pushed Tony away, let him run to Malibu instead of keeping him in New York where he was safe.

"Eyewitness reports are saying that Stark was still trapped inside when the mansion was destroyed."

He'd called him a coward, said he wasn't a hero.

"Authorities are still calling him missing but inside sources say that it's unlikely he survived the fall."

He lets out a sob but it's drowned out by the man next to him saying, "And good riddance to him." There's a general murmur of agreement. At the bar, Natasha winces.

Steve sees red.

* * *

He has very little memory of what happens next. Natasha tells him later that he'd gone for his shield, taken out every man in the bar, except for the bartender. He'd left him alive to tell them where the missing Chitauri weapons were. Steve hadn't even bothered to find the weapons himself, leaving that for Natasha to do, while he attempted to hijack the Quinjet. Natasha had stopped him though. Steve isn't sure what she'd done, if she'd actually physically stopped him or simply reminded him that he was incapable of flying the Quinjet.

He's not even entirely certain when he was told that Tony was still alive (and saved the president and stopped the Mandarin and destroyed all his armors).

The next thing he _does_ remember is standing in the doorway of a hospital room in Miami. Tony's laying in the bed, sniping at Pepper and Rhodes who are both fussing over him.

"Pep, Pep," Tony's pleading, "I'm not even the one who should be in this bed. _You_ should be in this bed. You're the one with the unstable, experimental virus in your blood."

"Thanks for the reminder," Pepper says dryly. "I'm also not the one who almost drowned two days ago."

Natasha pushes past him into the room. "Antoshka," she says. Tony's face lights up as he sees her. She shoves Rhodes aside and pulls Tony into a fierce hug. "Don't you ever do something like that again."

"Yeah, Tones," Rhodes chimes in, not looking at all put out that Natasha had pushed him out of the way. "There are better ways to get attention."

Steve can't stop himself from letting out a small chuckle. Tony looks up past Natasha, sees him, and freezes. "Steve," Tony breathes out.

"Hi, Tony," he says quietly.

There's a long moment and then Natasha says, "Well, this is sufficiently awkward." She hooks her arms through Pepper and Rhodes'. "Come on. You can show me the cafeteria."

Rhodes looks like he wants to protest but Natasha steers him toward the door. Steve steps aside to let them out and then moves back into the doorway.

"You don't have to hover there," Tony points out. He gestures to the chair next to the bed. "Sit down."

Steve does. There's another long moment of silence, broken by Tony saying, "So-"

"I'm so sorry," Steve interrupts.

Tony's jaw clicks shut.

He hurries to say, "I don't know that you'll ever believe me but I'm so sorry. I didn't mean anything I said and I shouldn't have said it and if you never forgive me, I'll understand because I was a _horrible_ friend. I hurt you. I accepted Clint's resignation and I let Bruce go and I didn't do either of those for you. I yelled at you and made you feel like you're less than you are."

He closes his mouth and waits for Tony to say something, anything. He's not even sure what he wants Tony to say.

"I know you're sorry but- I need time," Tony says slowly like he's thinking about it. "Before I'm ready to see you again."

Steve nods and turns to go. Tony reaches out a hand to hold onto his. "I'll text you," he says. "Text me back?"

A smile spreads across his face and he nods again. "I'd like that."

* * *

He settles in D.C.

Tony hasn't explicitly asked him to leave the tower but the Malibu mansion is destroyed and, while Steve knows that Tony has other houses, he suspects that the tower is home in a way the others aren't. So he goes to Fury and asks for assignment in D.C. Fury assigns him to one of the strike teams. He ships out often enough that he finds an apartment near the Triskelion.

He's not sure where Natasha ends up- if she stays in New York or goes wherever Clint is or finds her own home. They do a lot of missions together but not all of them.

He doesn't really like the strike team. Rumlow's kind of a dick and the others take their cue from him so when he makes misogynistic comments about one of the female agent's chest, they do too. They're not the Howlies and they're certainly not the Avengers.

He misses Tony.

* * *

_From TS 01/01/14 04:11 a.m.: Thinking about removing the arc reactor. Thoughts?_

_From SR 01/01/14 06:22 a.m.: Do you want to?_

_From TS 01/01/14 06:23 a.m.: Don't know. Kind of feels like it represents the changes I've made. Symbolic, you know?_

_From TS 01/01/14 06:23 a.m.: But it hurts._

_From TS 01/01/14 10:58 a.m.: Can't remove the reactor. Diminished lung capacity. Can't fix it._

_From SR 01/01/14 10:58 a.m.: I'm sorry, Tony._

* * *

_From TS 01/11/14 01:20 p.m.: Thor's in London._

_From SR 01/11/14 01:21 p.m.: Yeah, damn near destroyed the city too. Helped with the cleanup._

_From SR 01/11/14 01:21 p.m.: You contact him?  
_

_From TS 01/11/14 01:22 p.m.: Tried. Got ahold of Dr. Foster instead. She said Thor wasn't ready to come back to the Avengers._

_From SR 01/11/14 01:23 p.m.: Got it._

* * *

_From TS 01/28/14 03:42 p.m.: Brucie's back! He says hi._

_From SR 02/03/14 09:38 p.m.: Hi, Bruce!_

_From TS 02/03/14 09:39 p.m.: How was your mission? Siberia, right?_

_From SR 02/03/14 09:40 p.m.: Stop hacking into SHIELD files._

_From TS 02/04/14 01:14 a.m.: I wanted to know why you hadn't said anything._

_From SR 02/04/14 01:14 a.m.: Go to bed, Tony._

_From TS 02/04/14 01:14 a.m.: Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww_

_From SR 02/04/14 01:14 a.m.: Tony?_

_From SR 02/04/14 01:18 a.m.: Sweet dreams._

* * *

_From SR 02/18/14 11:17 p.m.: How are the bots?_

_From TS 02/18/14 11:18 p.m.: Just got DUM-E running again last week. He has happily used the fire extinguisher on everything in the new lab twice so far so he's in time out._

_From TS 02/18/14 11:18 p.m.: I'm working on Butterfingers. Should have him working again in a few weeks._

_From TS 02/18/14 11:18 p.m.: U was destroyed in the Mandarin attack but his code is all backed up to one of the servers here in New York so I'll be able to rebuild him._

_From SR 02/18/14 11:21 p.m.: Tell them I said hi._

* * *

_From SR 02/24/14 11:15 a.m.: Saw a cat on my run today. Reminded me of you._

_From SR 02/24/14 11:15 a.m.: [033845.jpg]_

_From TS 02/24/14 12:56 p.m.: Are you saying I'm fat?_

_From TS 02/24/14 12:56 p.m.: This meeting's boring._

_From SR 02/24/14 12:57 p.m.: I'm saying you're lazy. Pay attention to your meeting._

_From TS 02/24/14 12:57 p.m.: Why? I'm smarter than they are._

_From TS 02/24/14 12:57 p.m.: Except Pepper._

_From TS 02/24/14 12:58 p.m.: I'm not smarter than Pepper._

* * *

_From TS 03/05/14 03:45 p.m.: I'll be in D.C. tomorrow. You wanna go see a movie?_

_From SR 03/05/14 03:45 p.m.: Sure! :)_

* * *

_From SR 03/10/14 05:30 p.m.: Going on a mission. Radio silence for a week._

_From TS 03/10/14 06:01 p.m.: Be safe._

* * *

_From SR 03/17/14 10:09 a.m.: Just got back. No casualties. Heading in for debrief now._

_From TS 03/17/14 01:37 p.m.: :)_

* * *

_From SR 03/28/14 04:07 a.m.: Keep passing this guy on my morning runs._

_From SR 03/28/14 04:07 a.m.: [07827364.jpg]_

_From TS 03/28/14 04:08 a.m.: Aww, have you made a friend?_

_From SR 03/28/14 04:08 a.m.: Think I can irritate him into talking to me?_

_From TS 03/28/14 04:08 a.m.: ...What the fuck, Steve? Nobody makes friends like that._

_From SR 03/28/14 04:08 a.m.: You irritated me into talking to you._

_From SR 03/28/14 04:08 a.m.: I bet I can irritate him into talking to me._

_From TS 03/28/14 04:09 a.m.: Fine, but when I win, we're going to a Yankees game and you're going to cheer for the Yankees._

_From SR 03/28/14 04:09 a.m.: Why would you say that when you know it hurts me?_

_From TS 03/28/14 04:09 a.m.: If you're scared you'll lose, we don't have to bet on it._

_From SR 03/28/14 04:10 a.m.: I didn't say that._

_From SR 03/28/14 04:10 a.m.: When I win, you have to go with me to the Met Gala this year. I know they invited you._

_From TS 03/28/14 04:10 a.m.: Ew, art._

_From SR 03/28/14 04:11 a.m.: If you're scared you'll lose, we don't have to bet on it._

_From TS 03/28/14 04:11 a.m.: Stop throwing my words back at me._

_From TS 03/28/14 04:11 a.m.: You have a week and you have to prove he talked to you by Facetiming me. Got it?_

* * *

_From TS 04/01/14 09:19 a.m.: The Dodgers lost the game last night._

_From TS 04/01/14 09:19 a.m.: How are your efforts with Air Force Runner?_

_From SR 04/01/14 11:28 a.m.: I hate you._

_From TS 04/01/14 11:29 a.m.: No you don't :)_

* * *

_From SR 04/02/14 05:56 a.m.: He glared at me today. Does that count?_

_From TS 04/02/14 03:42 p.m.: No._

_From SR 04/02/14 03:58 p.m.: Fuck you._

_From TS 04/02/14 03:59 p.m.: Promises, promises._

* * *

_From TS 04/04/14 02:08 a.m.: Hey, Steve? I really miss you. When are you coming home?_

_From TS 04/04/14 05:15 a.m.: Yikes. You can ignore that. I was kind of drunk._

_From TS 04/04/14 05:20 a.m.: Hey! Last day to get Air Force Runner to talk to you. I've already got your Yankees hat picked out :)_

* * *

_From TS 04/05/14 10:58 a.m.: Steve? Is it something I said?_

_From TS 04/05/14 04:17 p.m.: We don't have to go to the Yankees game if you don't want to._

* * *

_From TS 04/06/14 03:22 p.m.: Steve?_

* * *

_From TS 04/07/14 08:10 a.m.: What's going on? The news is showing assassins in the street and I can't get ahold of you. Are we assembling?_

* * *

_From TS 04/08/14 09:39 p.m.: Steve???_

* * *

_From TS 04/09/14 11:30 a.m.: STEVE!_

* * *

The first time Steve awakes after the crash of the helicarriers, Sam is sitting beside him, playing some sort of jazzy music. The second time he awakens, Sam is still sitting beside him but next to him is Tony.

Tony notices he's awake first and he glares fiercely. "You're a fucking idiot, Rogers," he snaps.

Steve winces. He should have expected that.

"You should have called me," he continues, voice getting louder. "You think I didn't build a fail-safe in case the helicarriers were hacked?"

"Isn't that what we used to take them down?" Steve argues. "Your fail-safe?" That's what Hill had said- that Tony had originally designed them.

It's the wrong thing to say. Tony shouts, "Those were meant for use _before_ the helicarriers even got off the ground so that they _don't_ crash into the Potomac! God, Steve, what were you thinking?"

"What would you have done?" Sam butts in. Steve and Tony both turn to glare at him. He holds up his hands. "I'm serious, man. What do you think would have been better?"

"I would have hacked them," Tony says simply. "I designed those systems. I left myself a backdoor. Could've done it from the ground." He glances away and his voice quiets, "Didn't trust what Fury wanted to use them for."

"They still would have crashed," Steve points out.

Tony can't hide a small smile as he admits, "They were designed to explode."

Steve can't stop himself. He laughs because that's just so _Tony_. "You always did like your explosions," he says fondly.

Tony grins back at him and Steve thinks that, maybe, he's been forgiven.

* * *

The next time he awakens, Sam and Tony are still there, but now they're joined by Natasha. For a moment, Steve simply watches them. They're playing some sort of card game. From his bed, he can't tell what it is but Natasha's got a stack of one hundred-dollar bills nearly three inches high sitting beside her and Tony's is only a little smaller (Sam barely has any) so he thinks they're probably playing poker or something.

Then, completely seriously, Tony asks, "Sam, do you have any twos?"

Just as deadpan, Sam says, "Go fish."

"Shit," Tony mutters and draws a card out of the stack in the middle.

Steve bursts out laughing. Tony looks up at the noise, his face splitting in a broad smile. "You're awake again!" he exclaims.

"Looks like it," Steve agrees. "Hey Sam, Natasha. Where you been?"

"Congress," Natasha says. "Congressional hearing about what happened to SHIELD. They're looking for a scapegoat."

"But we're not gonna give them one, are we, Nat?" Tony says pointedly. Steve wonders if that had been Natasha's original plan.

"Called in a few favors," she says, ignoring Tony to reach under her seat and pull out a folder. "This is all the information available on the Winter Soldier."

"Any news on where Bucky might be?" he asks absently. He flips through the folder, noting where Bucky's been sighted more than once. He doubts it's anything more coincidental as multiple jobs happening in the same place but maybe he'll have a bolt hole there.

Sam and Natasha both shake their heads. Tony, on the other hand, casually says, "He's been visiting your exhibit at the Smithsonian every day for the past week."

All heads turn to Tony. "Bad cards," he mutters at his deck. When the silence continues, he looks up, as though surprised that _they're_ surprised he knows where Bucky is. "What? Most of their stuff is from Howard's collection and I think he might actually rise from the grave to murder me if anything goes missing- thanks for that, Winghead- so I put JARVIS in their systems. He pinged Barnes at the museum eight days ago." He raises an eyebrow. "And just where do you think you're going?"

Steve pauses from where he's swung his legs out of bed. "To go find Bucky."

"Yeah, no. Bad idea, Cap." Tony stands and gently pushes Steve back onto the bed with only one hand. Steve doesn't much care for that. He would have thought that the serum would have completely healed him by now.

"You don't get it," Steve protests. "I have to find him before he's gone again."

"I'm not saying we shouldn't talk to him. I'm saying _you_ shouldn't." There's a long pause. "Look, Spangles, for all that he's as much a victim here as the rest of us are, Barnes spent seventy years as a brainwashed assassin with a nearly perfect success rate. You're a failed mission and, if it's all the same to you, I'd like to avoid destroying the Air and Space Museum."

Steve scoffed lightly. "Bucky's not going to kill me."

"You don't know that," Sam points out.

"He broke his programming-"

"For a few minutes," Tony interrupts impatiently. "And he nearly killed you in the process. It's obvious that he's trying to figure out what you mean to him but-" He cuts off and runs a frustrated hand through his hair.

"But," Sam continues gently, "pushing the issue isn't the direction we should take. You're more likely to spook him. We'll never find him if he disappears again."

"He's my _soulmate_ ," Steve says plaintively like that's a reason to push. Tony flinches, something that Steve thinks is a little weird, but ignores it to glance over at Natasha. "Are you gonna gang up on me too?" he asks.

Natasha smiles wryly. "They're right and you know it or you wouldn't be asking me. I think we should send in Clint. He talked me out of my brainwashing, brought me in when a whole lot of people would have rather seen me dead."

Steve looks back at Tony and Sam. To his surprise, they're both nodding like they agree with her. Steve throws his hands up. "Why do they even call me team leader?" he complains to the ceiling. "You three are obviously running the show."

* * *

Natasha leaves to put the call in to Clint. Sam and Tony go back to their high stakes Go Fish game. They invite Steve to join and he does for a few minutes but he keeps dozing off. At one point, he blinks and opens his eyes to find that Tony has stolen his cards to make pairs out of what he can and Sam has stolen his winnings.

He gives up playing with them after that.

He blinks again and now Sam is gone and Tony is tapping away on his tablet. It's quiet in the hospital. The window is dark. Steve must have fallen asleep again. He stretches and then winces as he pulls at one of the wounds in his side. Without looking, Tony reaches over and fiddles with his pain meds.

"You're still here," Steve says softly. There's something weird about that, he knows, something about soulmates being the only ones allowed to stay after visiting hours but the upped morphine dosage is making him a little loopy and the thought barely flits across his mind before he forgets it.

Tony hums. "Do you want me to leave?"

"I never want you to leave," Steve says honestly. "Had enough of leaving."

Tony smiles but it's somewhat sad. Steve doesn't like it. There's something he's supposed to tell Tony, something important, but it's just out of reach.

"You can come back to the tower," Tony says. "You and Barnes."

Steve remembers. "Wait," he says, resting a hand on top of Tony's. "Before you let me come back, I have to tell you something."

He reaches for the folder Natasha gave him and flips to the back page before passing it to Tony. Tony glances at him, brow furrowing, and then down at the folder. "Mission report: December 16, 1991," he says softly. He looks back up. "Steve, what is this?"

Steve can't make himself say it. He swallows hard, watches as Tony's eyes track the movement. Tony returns to the folder, running a thumb over the picture. "I know that road," he whispers. "That car... Steve, did the Winter Soldier-?"

"Yes," Steve chokes out. He can't stop the tears from sliding down his face. Howard had been his _friend_ but Bucky was his soulmate and it _hurt_ to know that his soulmate had been forced to kill his friend. Worse than all of that is that he _never_ wanted to hurt Tony like this- Tony whose expression is shattered and yanking his hand away from Steve's.

"He killed my _mom_ ," Tony says and now he's crying too. Steve wants to pull him into his arms but he doesn't have that right. Tony isn't his.

"I'm sorry," he murmurs instead. "I'm so sorry." He keeps repeating it as Tony continues to sob, eventually deciding that he really doesn't care whether it's seemly or not. He reaches over to pull Tony out of his chair. Even in his weakened state, Tony's easy to lift onto the bed, weighing practically nothing to Steve.

To his surprise, Tony curls into him, letting Steve hold him close. Steve strokes his hair, listening quietly as Tony's sobs turn into softly hitching cries and then slowly settle into deep even breathing that tells him he's fallen asleep.

There's a small part of him that loathes himself right now because holding Tony feels _right_. It feels perfect like something has clicked into place. Steve hasn't felt like that in a long time, probably since before he became Captain America. And he doesn't deserve any of it because Tony isn't his and Steve keeps hurting him and then there's Bucky, who's actually alive. He should let go, should let his feelings for Tony fade away, but he doesn't.

He's not sure how long they lay there. For the most part, the serum has burned off the morphine but there's still a haze over his mind and time slips by.

At some point, Natasha shows up. Steve doesn't bother asking her how she got in. He's sure she isn't supposed to be here but nothing stops Natasha from being where she wants to be. She looks down at Tony, asleep on the bed, and then at where Steve's hand is gently carding through his hair. Her face is unreadable, almost forcefully blank. He gets the impression that she's doing some very quick thinking. He wonders, not for the first time, what's going on inside her head.

"Did you tell him?" she asks. He nods. "How did it go?"

Steve shrugs as best he can in a bed. "Well as can be expected," he replies.

She's changed clothes, he notices, out of the suit she was wearing at the hearing and into a pair of sweats.

"You get some sleep?" he asks.

"Some," she says. She sits down in the seat that Tony's vacated and nods at him sleeping on Steve's chest. "Glad he is. I don't think he's slept since SHIELD fell. He's been very worried about you and then SHIELD falling made him very busy."

Steve frowns and she sighs. "Look, SHIELD needed to be taken down. We did the right thing but- HYDRA's files weren't the only ones released. Tony's spent the last week getting our agents out of bad situations, creating new identities for the ones with families... it's been a mess."

Steve leans his head back and breathes out heavily. He hadn't even thought about the agents. He'd been so focused on the bad- HYDRA, the Winter Soldier, Project Insight- that he'd forgotten all about the good.

"Shit," he mutters. His grip on Tony tightens until Tony lets out a small whimper. Steve's grip loosens immediately.

"You can't do that, Steve," Natasha warns. "You can't blame yourself like this."

"It's my fault," he argues.

"It's not. HYDRA had to go and SHIELD was too tangled up with it."

"People could have died."

Natasha doesn't say anything and Steve knows what's behind that silence. People did die. His mouth twists and he looks down.

"Fuck," he swears.

"I didn't come here to tell you about SHIELD," Natasha says quietly. "Clint called. He's got a location on Barnes's hotel. He'll talk to him tomorrow. Best case scenario: we can bring Barnes in as early as tomorrow afternoon. Worst case, Barnes disappears and we have to track him down. But if Barnes is anything like I was, Clint will have to talk to him for a few weeks before we can bring him in. He wanted to know where to take him if we get best case."

Steve's silent for a long time. "Tony said we could bring him to the tower but that was before," he says finally.

"I won't go back on my promise," Tony says drowsily. Steve startles, unaware that Tony's been awake. He glances down to see an unhappy tightness around his eyes.

"I'm not going to do that," he replies.

"Why not?" And now Tony looks even more upset. "Don't you want him to come home?"

"Of course I do," Steve says. "But not if it's gonna hurt you."

"But he's your soulmate," Tony says and there's something almost anguished in his voice but now isn't the time to worry about that.

"Yeah and you're my best friend, Shellhead."

He doesn't mean to make him cry again but that's exactly what happens. It's just a few tears but Steve still doesn't know what to really do. He thinks Natasha sees his discomfort because she leans forward to give Tony a hug.

"Thank you," he mouths at her. She gives him a reassuring nod.

"Antoshka," she whispers so softly Steve can barely hear her. "Where do you want him to go?"

"I know he's just a victim," Tony begins hesitantly. "But he's still my mom's killer and I'm scared I'll try to hurt him if I see him."

He looks up at Natasha and whispers, "I don't want to hurt him."

Natasha smiles understandingly. "I'll tell Clint to take him back with him."

Tony looks over at Steve then with this worried look in his eyes like he's afraid he's going to yell at him for changing his mind. It breaks Steve's heart because, for Tony to have this instinctual reaction, someone (or many someones) must have done that in the past. So he just smiles and hugs Tony closer.

* * *

Bucky, as it turns out, isn't like Natasha at all.

He takes one look at Clint, hears what he has to tell him, and agrees to go with him. Steve thinks that it might have been Clint saying he'll take him down if Bucky goes Winter Soldier again that has him agreeing. The two leave together only ten minutes after Clint arrived.

Steve watches all of this from the museum's security feed on a tablet Tony passes him. He desperately wants to be there but he's not cleared to leave yet and Tony, infamous-for-checking-out-of-medical-AMA-Tony, threatens to use the armor to keep him there until the doctors say he can go.

He has visitors (Natasha visits twice, in between her trips to Capitol Hill, and Sam is there most days) during the remainder of his two-week stay so he's never bored but it's Tony who keeps him from wanting to jump out of bed and run all the way to Missouri, where Bucky is apparently settling in nicely according to Natasha.

Tony almost never leaves his room. He doesn't always pay attention to Steve but Steve doesn't always want the attention. They talk a lot and they laugh almost as much. Tony runs ideas for new tech by him and Steve offers as much feedback as he can. Sometimes, they watch movies together or play games. Sometimes, they sit in silence as Tony works on his tablet and Steve reads or sketches. For the first few nights, Tony had had another bed brought in and slept on that. The second bed disappears the first time Tony has a nightmare and Steve rips out his IV to get to him. Tony starts sleeping in Steve's bed.

It's wonderful and terrible all at the same time.

Steve can feel himself falling further in love with Tony. It's wonderful to have Tony there beside him and to wake up next to him, so tangled together that he doesn't know where he ends and Tony begins. It's perfect actually- except there's Bucky.

He still thinks that there might be another soulmate out there for him but his feelings for Tony didn't bother him when he thought that was the only soulmate out there. After all, plenty of people never find their soulmate and are perfectly happy with the person they settle down with. But with Bucky back, his feelings start to feel a little more like cheating and he feels guilty about it.

He knows that Bucky isn't the same person anymore and that he might never remember that he's Steve's soulmate. He knows that he's been cuddling Tony all while he's got another soulmate out there and Tony's got none but he can't help how he feels. Mostly, he just thinks that it isn't fair- not to him, not to Bucky, and certainly not to Tony.

It's why he doesn't stop Tony when, the day before Steve's meant to be released, Tony tells him that he's going back to New York.

"You're welcome back in the tower if you want to come," Tony says, hands shoved deep in his pockets. "But I don't want you to feel like you have to so I'm flying back today."

Steve almost feels like this is a test, like Tony's trying to figure out how much he means to Steve. But, if this is a test, then it's one that he'll fail no matter how he chooses. He's damned if he goes to Missouri, he's damned if he goes to New York, and he's doubly damned if he stays in D.C.

* * *

He goes to Missouri.


	3. Hanging in the Background

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the Asset doesn't know why his metal arm has a soulmark, escapes HYDRA, hides out on a farm in Missouri, and becomes Bucky Barnes again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !!!!!WARNING: Brief mention of suicide!!!!!
> 
> Thank you all for your patience as I worked on this chapter. I've been busy working on other works (soon to be released) and this one was giving me fits. And, in my defense, I originally started this fic thinking that it would have a grand total of about 20,000 words and now we're 30,000 words into it and I'm only a third of the way through it so...
> 
> Anyway, I know that amnesia/brainwashing doesn't work like this but handwavy comic book science. If the mcu can completely misuse the definition of a spectrometer, then I can ignore actual neuroscience.

The Asset doesn't know if he was born with a soulmark or not.

If he were to think about it, he would probably say that he was born with one because everyone seems to have one but, if it's not important to his mission, then he doesn't know. Soulmarks aren't important to his mission. He doesn't even know what it means.

He does have one though- a red and gold firebird rising from a bright blue flame. It appears immediately on his metal arm the first time they attach it to his shoulder. It both bewilders and infuriates his handlers and the Asset figures that he's probably not supposed to have it. There's nothing he can do about it though. The soulmark just appears, no matter how many times the technicians replace the wrist panel it sits on or the entire arm.

And they do replace it.

They design new panels and new arms, each one gleaming and blank save for the red star on the shoulder. The new piece remains blank right up until it gets attached to the Asset. Then there's always a searing heat in his wrist that he thinks shouldn't happen- he shouldn't be able to feel anything- and when it fades, there's a firebird on his wrist.

Eventually, some years after the Asset is first activated, they give up on trying to replace the mark and start painting over it.

* * *

The Asset doesn't have many memories from before his wipes and what he does remember are flashes.

A shock of blond hair bent over a notebook.

A girl singing along to the radio in the kitchen.

The whistle of a bomb somewhere nearby.

Green liquid in a vial and the overwhelming sense of pain.

Blood blossoming over the front of a uniform.

A robin on someone’s wrist.

Strong hands pressing him down into a mattress.

The sense of _full_.

A whisper. "You're mine, Bucky Barnes."

He doesn't know who Bucky Barnes is but he's jealous of him.

Most of the time, he doesn't dream but sometimes, when he's on a long enough mission that he _does_ start to dream again, he dreams of a young man, no older than twenty, asleep in a bed. The Asset doesn't know if it's a memory or a fantasy but he always lets it play out as it wants. He always moves closer to the bed, gaze trailing over the dark hair and the long eyelashes. He's there for a bad reason, he knows and the voice that sometimes shows up in the back of his mind screams for him to stop but he can't. He starts to raise the pistol in his hand and then the boy shifts, his left hand uncurling from under his cheek.

The Asset catches a glimpse of his bare wrist and the firebird printed on it. He freezes. The Asset doesn't quite know what it means that their marks match but something inside him is snarling, " _Mine_."

In some of the dreams, the ones that are both better and more frustrating, the Asset straddles him and wakes him up. But he doesn't know what color the man's eyes are and he can't imagine them and the frustration mounts until he wakes himself up. Most of the time, he just leaves the way he did the first time he dreamed about him. 

* * *

Sometimes, the Asset looks down at where the mark on his wrist is hidden under the paint and thinks, _Wrong_. He doesn't really know what's wrong about it, just that it is. He thinks that maybe it's that voice in the back of his head that's telling him it's wrong.

Sometimes, the mark feels like it belongs to someone else, that it shouldn't be sitting on his wrist. When it feels like that, he always has a flash of long fingers and blond hair. But he can't picture a face so he doesn't worry about it.

He's supposed to tell his handlers when he has flashes like that. They distract from his missions. They're supposed to be wiped clean from his mind.

But sometimes, when he has those flashes, he feels- not quite happy but not quite anything else either- safe, maybe. He likes feeling that way.

* * *

He isn't stupid.

He's been deployed as a ghost for seventy years. He's assassinated presidents and scientists and kings. He's toppled governments and he's done it all from the shadows. The most anyone has ever said about it has been in hushed whispers, all just rumors drifting on the wind.

For his handler to demand that he kill Nick Fury in as public a manner as possible and then to go after a couple of superheroes in broad daylight... The Asset knows that he's not supposed to return from this mission. Whether he's supposed to get caught or killed, he's not sure but HYDRA has clearly decided that he's no longer needed.

And when things aren't needed in HYDRA, they're disposed of.

But the Asset isn't the world's best assassin for nothing. He lets his handler give him his mission and then he goes to the apartment they have for him during D.C. missions and thinks.

HYDRA plans to have him die during this mission so his first option is the easiest: to die. The Asset, designed for long-term use, mostly shies away from this option but, at the same time, he's been an assassin for seventy years. He's...tired, almost. Seventy years is a lifetime and he's spent all of it killing. Surely it's his turn now.

But there's still something in him that wants to live so he sets the option aside as something to come back to and considers the next one: completing the mission quietly and returning to HYDRA. He doesn't much like that one, if only because he's sure that HYDRA would just kill him when he returns and that seems counterproductive.

He completely discards that option and thinks that he could maybe do exactly what HYDRA wants- several loud, public assassinations- and then escape in the ensuing chaos. The Asset has contemplated escape before but only attempted it once. He doesn't even remember the attempt itself, only the pain that had come afterwards. Sometimes, his handlers remind him of his failure and he shudders just as he does now. But back then, HYDRA had wanted him back. They don't want him back now. Maybe- just maybe- he can escape now.

That voice is reminding him now that he doesn't have to just escape, that he knows why he's being disposed of. He's been awake for over a month, the longest he's been out of cryosleep in years, all so he can help protect Project Insight. He knows that they're going to replace him with the helicarriers because who needs an assassin when they've got the destructive capabilities of Project Insight? He knows that people- good, innocent people- are going to die at the hands of the helicarriers and the voice, growing stronger the longer he's awake, tells him that it doesn't have to be like that.

He could team up with the superheroes HYDRA is sending them after. The Asset knows more about the helicarriers than anyone, save their inventor. He's got lists of their weaknesses, including some that he, for reasons he hasn't examined too closely, hasn't told anyone about.

He pushes those thoughts aside. The Asset is not a hero, he's a weapon.

* * *

It all falls apart when the man on the bridge recognizes him.

The Asset _knows_ him.

More importantly, the man knows _him_.

Pierce shoves him into a chair, jams a bit between his teeth, and tells the technicians to wipe his mind. He knows that it's coming, knows that in a few minutes, he won't remember anything else. He'll be a clean slate, ready to comply. But for a few shining, glorious seconds-

Bucky _remembers_.

* * *

He doesn't quite know what to do with himself.

The man on the helicarrier- Captain America (Steve?)- had called him Bucky but that doesn't feel like him. Bucky is a name that belongs to someone else ( _"You're mine, Bucky Barnes."_ ). But he's not the Asset either. He doesn't know who he is.

He just is.

The first few days after HYDRA falls, he doesn't leave his hotel room, sure that someone is coming for him. But his room remains undisturbed. He doesn't see anyone watching when he peeks out the windows. There are no surprise visits from room service or the maid. He is alone.

In the past, it had taken nearly a month to start experiencing the memory flashes or the dreams. Now though- maybe because of Captain America- they begin only a few days after the crash into the Potomac. He dreams of a dark-haired man with long eyelashes and a firebird on his wrist. He has flashes of a skinny blond with a wet cough and a robin on his. He doesn't know which is real- or if neither is.

* * *

He ventures downstairs for breakfast and passes a display case of things to do in D.C. He stops.

There's a picture of Captain America on one of the brochures. He picks up the brochure- _The First Avenger: Steve Rogers_. He looks at the picture of Captain America in tights, tiny shorts, and red heeled boots. His mouth twitches, almost a smile if he remembered how to smile. He flips the brochure over- _Now on permanent display at the National Air and Space Museum!_

It might still be dangerous. There might still be people watching his hotel. He probably should have left the city days ago.

He goes anyway.

He wanders slowly through the exhibit, hoping to trigger more of the flashbacks. It doesn't really work. There's too much of Captain America here and not enough of Steve Rogers. He doesn't know why but he gets the feeling that it was Steve Rogers who was important to him, not Captain America.

There's almost nothing about Bucky Barnes, except for a uniform and a small display board. He glances at the display board but it's nothing that couldn't be found on the internet, just a birth date, a death date, and a few facts. Apparently, Bucky Barnes' favorite color was blue, his favorite food was the spaghetti the Italian family upstairs had made, and he liked the Dodgers.

He doesn't know what the Dodgers are.

He turns his attention to the video playing beside it. Captain America and Bucky Barnes are standing together, laughing about something. There's narration accompanying the video but it fades into the background.

* * *

_They'd been told that the photographer is going to use the pictures for promotional material so they try to stand tall and straight, frowning seriously into the distance._

_"No!" the photographer- Bucky thinks his name is Stan- shouts. "You're not heroes! You're human!"_

_He exchanges an amused glance with Steve. "And here I thought we were dogs," he quips._

_From behind Stan, Dum Dum howls mockingly. Steve shoots him the patented Captain America Glare of Disappointment. They try smiling next but Stan tells them they look stilted so then they try to pose but Stan just gets more upset._

_"Don't you two like each other?" he asks._

_"Yeah," Gabe shouts, leaving his conversation with Stan's pretty assistant. "Pretend you're friends."_

_Bucky replies, "But we are friends." Steve dissolves into laughter. It's the picture of the two of them laughing together that shows up on the cover of Time Magazine two weeks later. Stan sends them a copy with the inscription, "Thanks for being human," on the inside cover._

* * *

He stumbles back and glares at the video, now showing footage of the two of them planning a mission. He hates it, hates that it gave him this memory, because he's not human. He's been twisted and ruined into something monstrous and certainly not human.

It doesn't stop him from coming back the next day.

* * *

_They're boys, just beginning to discover their libidos, stretched out in bed together. Steve's release is co-mingled with Bucky's drying on his stomach. He thinks that he should probably find a towel or a washcloth but Steve's holding his hand, running his thumb over Bucky's mark._

_"You're mine, Bucky Barnes," Steve whispers. The words sound familiar like he's said it before. But the next part, the part where Steve says, "'Til the end of the line," that part's new and Bucky shivers._

_"'Til the end of the line, huh?" he asks. He rolls over to face Steve. "Sounds pretty special."_

_Steve blushes, his cheeks glowing rosy red. It's the healthiest he's looked since before he had the flu last month. Bucky luxuriates in the fact that he made Stevie look like that. No one else did. Just him._

_"You're a pretty special guy," Steve says._

_"How special?"_

_"The most special." Steve pushes him back onto his back and climbs over him to straddle his hips. Bucky's hands automatically fly to his waist. Steve rolls his hips forward and he keens. "You're my soulmate."_

* * *

He listens as the narrator says, "Best friends since childhood, Bucky Barnes and Steven Rogers were inseparable on both schoolyard and battlefield."

"That's not right," he says.

He doesn't realize that the nearby docent hears him until she asks, "I'm sorry?"

He freezes, suddenly hoping that his long hair and beard is enough to keep him from being recognized. No one's realized yet that the Winter Soldier is Bucky Barnes and he'd like to keep it that way.

For a moment, he considers not replying to her but she's leading a tour group and they all seem interested in what he has to say. He looks down at the floor and says, "I just thought they were soulmates, is all."

She smiles kindly. "It's an interesting theory," she says. "Certainly a popular one if you read the forums. There's no record of either Barnes or Rogers' marks and Rogers must have deeply cared about Barnes to go after him in Azzano. But Commando Gabriel Jones said their marks didn't match."

He wants to snarl, "What does _Gabe_ know about it?" He doesn't, too startled by the realization that it wasn't his thought to say the words aloud. That thought belongs to Bucky, who he's long thought to be lost.

He looks down at his left wrist. He's been hiding the metal arm with long sleeves and gloves but, under the glove, he knows that the paint HYDRA had used to cover his mark is starting to chip off. He thinks of the man from his flashes, the one with the robin on his wrist. It doesn't match the firebird on his but he still has that sense that they were soulmates.

He's missing something.

* * *

_Steve's sitting at the table when Bucky comes home from work. There's an open letter in front of him. His eyes are bright and Bucky knows immediately that something is wrong. He's opening his mouth to ask about it when Steve says, "You were drafted." He pushes the letter toward Bucky._

_He sits down heavily. "Oh." He doesn't bother reading over the letter, already knowing what it says. "Where do they want me?"_

_"Wisconsin. Next week," Steve says dully._

_Bucky likes to think that the inflection in Steve's voice is because he doesn't want him to go to the front but he knows better. Steve sounds this way because he too wants to fight. Bucky's argued with him about it- over and over and over again- until they were both tired of fighting so he says nothing now._

_He knows that Steve hates bullies, that he wants to protect those more helpless than he, but even after all the years he's known him, it still bothers him that Steve doesn't see himself as one of those helpless. It's both admirable and frustrating that Steve refuses to admit his own limitations. Bucky's afraid that it's going to get him killed one of these days and now Bucky won't be there to fight by his side._

_This war is claiming people and now it's taking Bucky. He doesn't want it to take Steve too._

* * *

"Who writes this shit?" he mutters.

"I know, right?" the person beside him asks. He tenses. He hadn't even heard the man walk up. He _always_ hears people approaching but, somehow, he'd missed this one.

The man doesn't seem to notice his tenseness and blithely continues, "I mean, Pearl Harbor was in ‘41 and Steve says you shipped out in ‘43 so there's no way you could have had winter training for a few weeks and then flown out to Italy. Their timeline doesn't make any sense. Fucking historians, right?"

He stiffens more. This man knows who he is. They've finally come for him. He glances over the man, noting the military haircut, the keen eyes, the practiced looseness of his body, the canvas bag at his feet that's probably hiding a gun. It's SHIELD then. He nods to himself and readies himself to fight. He prefers to run but he doesn't think that this man will let him.

"At ease, Soldier. Steve sent me," the man says. "Or, well, actually Natasha sent me but it's because Steve wanted her to."

"Who are you?" he demands.

"Clint Barton," the man says easily. "You might know me as Hawkeye."

He recognizes the name. He's one of the Avengers and a persistent thorn in HYDRA's side, always recruiting the people HYDRA wants before they can get to them. He's never gone up against Barton before but he doesn't think it'll be too difficult. HYDRA had kept an extensive dossier on how to take down all of SHIELD's best agents. Hawkeye, he remembers, has hearing problems. It would be easy enough to capitalize on that. He shifts himself further to the right, towards Barton's bad ear.

"And what about you?" Barton asks abruptly. "Are you the Winter Soldier? Bucky Barnes? Both? Neither?"

He takes a step back, surprised. Barton isn't attacking. His body language is open, nonthreatening. It could be a trap but he's trained to know traps. This doesn't feel like one.

"Neither," he replies. "I think."

"What do you call yourself then?"

He doesn't call himself anything. For years, he's been the Asset but he's not anymore. "I- I don't-" He falters and stops.

Barton nods understandingly. "Nat was the same way. How about James? Can I call you James?"

He looks again for any sense of wrongness and finds nothing but kindness in Barton's eyes. He nods slowly.

"I'll be honest with you, James. Cap's real excited to see you again."

"I'm not ready to see him," James admits.

Barton shrugs. "Yeah, we figured. That's why I'm here and not him."

"And... why are you here?"

"Cap wants us to bring you in," Barton says readily. "But I don't think you're ready for that and, truth be told, Tony isn't ready either."

James knows who Tony is too: Tony Stark, only child of Howard and Maria Stark, both of whom were murdered on December 16, 1991 by the Winter Soldier. "He blames me?" he asks.

"Nah. But he doesn't want to hurt you and he's scared he might."

James doesn't argue with him. Tony Stark's threat level was assessed by HYDRA as a "Do Not Engage" long before he ever became Iron Man. He thinks he might have been sent to kill him once, before his threat level had reached that point. He doesn't remember it but if he had, he had clearly failed.

“Then-?”

“I know a little something about brainwashing myself. Best way to get your head screwed back on is to go off on your own for a bit. Figured I’d offer you a place to stay while you get your memories back. I’ve got a farm out in Missouri, nice porch, soft bed, great view.”

“Did that work for you?”

“Sure did.”

Barton sticks his thumbs in his belt loops. James is sure that, if he wanted to, Barton would have no problems getting his bow before he could even reach for a gun but it still helps to put him at ease.

“And what if it doesn’t for me?” James asks.

“You asking if we’ll let you leave?”

 He wasn’t but- “Let’s go with that.”

“You’re not a prisoner, James.”

“What about-”

Barton doesn’t wait for him to finish before he says firmly, “I could put you down before you took a step closer.”

James has met many people who have claimed to be able to kill him and very few who might have actually been able to follow through but the way Barton says it, like there’s no doubt in his mind that he could kill James where he stood, is what gets to him.

He nods shortly.

* * *

Barton hadn’t told him there would be _children_ at his farm.

He freezes on the ramp of the jet and stares at the two kids running across the field toward Barton. He can’t do this. There are kids. What if he hurts one of them? He can’t run the risk of hurting them.

“You coming?” Barton calls from the bottom of the ramp. He’s got one child perched on his hip, the other one clinging to his hand. They’re both looking at James curiously.

Frantically, he shakes his head. Barton puts the kid down. “Why don’t you go tell your mom we’re here?” he murmurs. The kids run back off toward the house.

“I- I can’t-” James croaks. Barton smiles sympathetically.

“You can,” he promises. “You think I would have brought you here if I thought you would hurt them?” He shakes his head. “You gotta have some faith in me, James.”

James doesn’t know how to tell him that he has plenty of faith in Barton but absolutely none in himself. He thinks that Barton might already know that though from the way he’s watching him.

“We’ve been watching you,” Barton continues. “Tony’s systems found you the moment you stepped foot in the museum. I spent hours going over every ounce of footage we had on you, wanted to make sure I wasn’t walking into a trap or inviting a crazy person back to my family’s home. You’ve been through a lot this week but you haven’t lashed out at anyone. No one’s been hurt. I think you’re a lot safer than you think you are.”

“The hotel room-”

“So you trashed a hotel room, big deal,” Barton says with a shrug. “Plenty of people have done that. Fuck, Tony’s got an entire Wikipedia article listing how many rooms he’s destroyed.”

James gapes at him, not entirely certain how to respond. The audacity of this man assuming that a world-renowned assassin isn’t going to kill his entire family is astounding. He thinks he should keep protesting but what comes out is, “People really care about that?”

Barton smiles smugly, like he knows he’s won. “People care about a lot of things Tony does that they shouldn’t.” He jerks his head toward the house. “Come inside and I’ll tell you more of them.”

And, well, James doesn’t really want to learn about Tony Stark but he doesn’t know how to fly this kind of jet and he suspects that Barton’s going inside whether he follows or not. So he follows.

* * *

“Eggs?” Laura asks.

He’s been at Barton’s- Clint’s- home for nine days now. Every morning, Laura makes breakfast (Clint keeps offering to give her a break and do it instead but Laura says, “If I wanted the kitchen burned down, I’d just ask.”). It’s usually eggs from their chickens and something else.

James doesn’t really like eggs but, when he’d been working for HYDRA- Clint calls it captured by- he’d learned that refusing food he doesn’t like only means that it gets taken away and he goes hungry.

He says, “Yes, ma’am.”

“So polite,” Laura says with a smile. “If only Cooper would take a page out of your book.”

The child in question, currently shoveling food into his mouth like this is his last meal, offers a sheepish grin. The effect is ruined by the half-chewed eggs in his mouth. “Sorry Mom,” he says, spraying food across the table.

“Gross,” Clint says mildly and reaches for a napkin.

It’s all so- so _nice_. James hasn’t been around people who like him in decades and it’s more than a little surreal. Clint takes him out shooting in the afternoon, claims it’s because he doesn’t want James to lose his marksmanship, and laughs instead of snarling when James, without thinking, quips, “I don’t think it’s _my_ aim you need to worry about.” Laura thanks him every time he helps out around the farm, which seems to be her domain more than Clint’s. The kids both seem to enjoy playing with him. They teach him the rules of basketball and don’t complain when his metal hand accidentally grips the ball harder than he’s meaning to and crushes it. Lila offers to let him pick what they watch on TV. When James admits that he doesn’t know anything about TV or movies, she takes over teaching him the pop culture of the last seventy years. Cooper tries to teach him baseball, only to get immensely excited when it turns out that James apparently already knows how to play baseball.

The game gets put on hold when James experiences a flashback.

He’s starting to get those more often now too. He doesn’t really know how HYDRA had wiped his memories, whether it was the cryogenics or the electrotherapy he was subjected to, but it seems that the longer he goes without the treatment, the more his memories start to return. Sometimes, they’re just flashes and sometimes, they’re scenes. But sometimes, they’re a whole group of memories- like when he tries to play baseball with Cooper and ends up curled in a ball on the ground, clutching his aching head, while his brain is assaulted with dozens of memories of him playing ball.

Those kinds of flashbacks don’t happen often thankfully. They’re mostly painless and far less dramatic.

Slowly, he’s learning to relax into his new life. He’s still looking over his shoulder for HYDRA but at least he’s stopped reaching for weapons when someone startles him. Although it’s gratifying that both Clint and Laura (who apparently is an ex-SHIELD agent) have also reached for the butter knife when Cooper whooped loudly at the baseball game on TV.

Lila leans over to him. “Why do you say ‘yes’ to the eggs when you don’t like them?” she whispers.

He looks at her, startled out of his reverie. He knows that Lila, out of the two kids, is mostly likely to take after her father but he hadn’t realized she was so eagle-eyed. “I like the eggs just fine,” he mutters, not wanting to insult Laura’s cooking and certainly not wanting to risk his food being taken away.

She looks unimpressed. “Hey, Mom?” she asks, raising her voice. James tries to shush her but, short of slapping his hand over her mouth, there’s nothing he can do to stop her from saying, “James doesn’t really like eggs.”

Laura looks as horrified as James feels. “You don’t?” she asks. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

He suspects that telling her that disliking food under HYDRA’s rule meant he went hungry is probably a bad idea. Instead, he shrugs and says, “The Depression,” which, as it turns out, is a good excuse for why he does anything.

Laura looks thoughtful for a moment. “Food shortages,” she agrees. “Probably reminds you of powdered eggs. I don’t much care for powdered eggs myself.”

James, who hasn’t known why he dislikes eggs for seventy years, knows in his soul that that’s exactly why he doesn’t like them. Nasty, watery things that they are. He nods fervently, glad that she’s latched on to that as a reason. Clint looks too discerning for his comfort but he doesn’t say anything to his wife’s statement.

He’s just starting to relax, daring to hope that his food won’t be taken away from him, when Laura picks up the plate. He tenses for a second but then slumps. He should have expected this. Disliking food is an insult to the cook as his ma used to tell him- or he thinks his ma used to say that. It might have been Steve’s ma.

But to his surprise, Laura doesn’t take the plate any farther than the counter. “Is it eggs in general that you don’t like or can I make you a quiche?” she asks as she scrapes the eggs into the sink.

James doesn’t know what a quiche is- though he has an odd memory of eating one in 1940’s France- and he tells her so. She explains it and he tries to remember if he liked that quiche or hated it. He thinks he liked it so he nods.

“In the meantime, here’s more bacon,” she says and puts his plate back in front of him.

James nearly cries at the simple kindness. When it turns out that he doesn’t actually like quiches and Laura doesn’t complain, just swaps it out for pancakes, he does cry.

* * *

Clint finds him fiddling with the tractor two days later. Laura had been complaining at breakfast that it wasn’t working. James had thought that he remembered being a pretty decent mechanic before the war so he had offered to take a look at it. This though might be beyond his expertise. The engines he remembers were a lot simpler.

He wipes his hands on a towel, ridding them of most of the grease and oil, and straightens up. “Clint,” he says evenly.

“Steve called,” Clint says bluntly. That’s one of those things James likes about Clint. He doesn’t beat around the bush, just straight up honesty. “He’s being released in a week, wants to know if coming out here is an option for him.”

James goes very still. “What did you tell him?” he asked, desperately trying to sound casual, hoping that he’s hiding how nervous he is.

“Told him that was up to you. Steve doesn’t have to be welcome if you don’t want him here.”

James isn’t sure if he’s ready to see Steve again or even if he’ll ever be ready to see him again. He may not remember much but he _does_ remember that even though Steve had been a punk when they were younger, he’d also been fiercely loyal and protective and so very kind towards those who needed it. He thinks that Bucky might have been able to stand proudly by Steve’s side but James, no matter how unwillingly, spent the last seventy years as an assassin. He doesn’t deserve to call himself Steve’s friend.

But there’s paint steadily chipping away from the firebird on his wrist and he now knows that the skinny blond with the robin from his memories is Steve. What he doesn’t know is why that’s important. Clearly, their marks don’t match so they can’t be soulmates but he doesn’t remember the marks of anyone else from his past.

Why does he remember Steve’s?

* * *

It’s late when Steve arrives.

James hadn’t been asleep though it’s well into the small hours of the morning. For most of his stay at Clint’s, his sleep has been marked with dreams of his past. But the last few days, the nightmares had come.

They mostly feature the torture he’d gone through but sometimes, he sees faces. He remembers the people he’s murdered. He remembers the feel of Maria Stark’s neck under his hand, the smell of the gun as he pulled the trigger on the American President, the look on the Black Widow’s face when he shot her.

He hasn’t slept much the past few days.

He hears the rumble of a car coming up the dirt driveway. Silently, he reaches for the gun under his mattress and creeps to the window. Carefully, he moves the curtain aside just enough that he can look out the window without anyone being able to look in on him. He knows that Steve’s coming to the house today but there’s still the possibility that it’s a HYDRA agent instead. He refuses to take the chance that anything bad will happen to this family.

The car is a bright yellow taxi that stops just in front of the door. A moment later, Steve gets out and goes around the back to pull a suitcase and a large, canvas bag out of the trunk. The taxi drives off.

James can’t hear anything but he assumes by the way Steve’s head jerks up toward the porch that either Clint or Laura has opened the door. He creeps out of his room and heads for the stairs.

“We’ve put you on the couch,” Clint is saying softly. “James has the guestroom.”

“That’s what he’s going by?”

“Not going to be a problem for you, is it?” Clint asks sharply. James, moving on silent feet down the stairs, takes a moment to be grateful this family has his back.

From his position on the stairs, he can’t see what Steve’s reaction is but the way Steve casually says, “I’ve called him James before. Think I can get used to it again,” makes him think that he probably shrugged.

He hadn’t known that he went by James at one point. In his mind, there’s only _now_ \- James- and _then_ \- Bucky. He wants to know who this other James was. He wants to know the things that only Steve knows about him.

“How’s Tony doing?” Clint asks.

James has moved enough that he can see the fond smile on Steve’s face when Clint mentions Stark’s name. His eyes narrow. He doesn’t like that smile. He thinks that that smile used to belong to only him.

“He’s doing better,” Steve admits. “The news really hit him hard. But I think he’ll be okay.”

“He went back to New York?”

The smile drops from Steve’s face. “Yeah,” he says quietly.

“Nat said she and the new guy are going with him.”

“Did they?” Steve sounds surprised. “Good for them.”

“Yeah, she said something about Tony convincing them to start up the Avengers again.”

Steve looks at him sharply. “He is? He didn’t say anything about that to me.”

He almost sounds plaintive about it. James can’t help but wonder why Steve thinks he has the right to know what Stark’s doing, what exactly Stark means to him.

James can’t see Clint’s face but he knows that his stance says that he’s exasperated. He wants to know why. He’s missing some of the information and he doesn’t like that. There are things going on here and he thinks that maybe Bucky could have figured them out but he certainly can’t.

“Get some sleep, Cap,” Clint says after a moment, handing him a pile of blankets.

He leaves before James can scramble out of the way but he doesn’t say anything about his eavesdropping, just briefly clasps his shoulder and then climbs the stairs. James risks peeking into the room again.

Steve has dropped onto the couch and is now staring at his phone. “Why didn’t he tell me?” he mutters. He seems to deliberate about it for a second and then raises the phone to his ear. With his enhanced hearing, James can hear the phone ringing even through Steve’s repeated, “Pick up, pick up, pick up.”

The phone goes to voicemail. Steve’s shoulders slump. He hangs up without leaving a message and tosses it aside. “Probably just working,” he says but it’s clear that he doesn’t believe his own words.

The phone vibrates. Steve all but dives for the phone. “Tony?” he asks. James wonders if he knows how breathless he sounds.

He hears a tinny voice warmly say, “Hey Winghead. Sorry I missed your call. You figure out where you’re going yet?”

“I- uh- I’m in Missouri.”

There’s a pause, long enough that Steve pulls the phone away from his ear to check if it’s been dropped. “Hey, I wanted to ask-” he starts

“Is it important?” Stark asks. The warm tone from a few seconds ago is gone, replaced by something flat and terse. “I’m kind of busy.”

Steve’s face crumples. Even though James doesn’t really know Steve right now, he still feels a protective surge rising in him. Stark doesn’t have the right to make him feel like that. “Oh,” he says quietly. “No, it’s not important.”

“Great,” Stark says impatiently. “So, we’ll talk later, yeah?” Before Steve can say anything, he chirps, “Bye!” and hangs up.

Steve looks devastated. James creeps away, thinking that he shouldn’t intrude any longer.

* * *

Living with Steve is…weird.

James _knows_ him and yet he doesn’t. He wakes up early in the morning, earlier still than Steve who rises with the dawn, and makes two cups of coffee, one dark as night with two sugars for himself and one more cream than coffee with five sugars for Steve, and doesn’t know how he knew to make it like that. He sees the Dodgers playing on TV and he knows that Steve has strong feelings about them but he doesn’t know if they’re positive or negative. Laura shows him a blue shirt she bought Steve and he casually says, “Nah, Stevie doesn’t like that shade of blue,” and then spends twenty minutes shaking, partially because it was like someone else was talking and partially because he doesn’t remember what shade of blue Steve _does_ like.

They have a history but James only remembers half of it.

He sort of wants to go to Steve to ask about it but Steve keeps looking at him like he’s seeing someone else. He thinks better about asking him.

Slowly, he starts getting more of his memories. The third time he automatically makes Steve’s cup of coffee, he remembers the thirty-two times he had to ask him how he liked it before he finally learned it. He walks past Steve swearing at the Miami Marlins for scoring a run against the Dodgers and remembers the one time he’d gotten tickets to a Dodgers game back in 1941 and how Steve had been so excited he’d- well, he doesn’t actually remember what Steve had done but he catches sight of himself blushing in the hall mirror and he thinks he can probably figure it out. He sees Steve rubbing at his mark and gets a glimpse of bright blue and knows immediately that that is his favorite shade of blue.

* * *

At first, he and Steve don’t talk much. James is too busy trying to gain his memories back, which are happening too slowly for his taste (Clint asks if maybe Bucky had been impatient and James laughs because it hadn’t just been Bucky- the Asset had _hated_ long stakeouts). Steve seems to be too busy remembering the person he’d lost.

But then there’s a night, about a week after Steve arrives, when he can’t sleep because every time he closes his eyes, he sees the Asset’s victims. He rolls over to check the time. It’s just after one in the morning. He stuffs a pillow over his head to muffle his groan. James is all for waking up early but this is definitely too early. He gets up with the intention of going downstairs to make a cup of warm milk, something he remembers Steve’s mother doing for him.

Steve’s already awake. He’s leaning against the counter, head in his hands. His phone’s resting on the counter. Steve’s glaring at it like it’ll magically start ringing if he wishes hard enough.

He’s been doing that a lot the last few days.

“Is the kitchen taken?” he asks roughly.

Steve startles, a feat in and of itself. He’s got the same enhanced hearing that James does so he must have been deep inside his head to miss him walking in. Surreptitiously, he swipes at his eyes. James glances away to give him some privacy.

“Come on in,” Steve says hoarsely, which James also ignores.

He gets out two mugs and a pot and turns the burner to low. Wordlessly, Steve passes him the milk. James pours it into the pot and then begins stirring, something that Sarah had told them to do lest the milk burn. Steve gets out crackers and cheese and begins plating them. James doesn’t remember why he’s doing it but it feels right.

Steve must feel his eyes on him because he murmurs, “Crackers and milk- Ma’s remedy for sleepless nights.”

James smiles crookedly as the memories come back to him. “I know.”

They work together on their snack, moving around each other as naturally as breathing. James, who’s never had partners but has had handlers that he worked with for years, knows that this kind of ease takes a lot of time and trust.

“Were we soulmates?” he asks as he pours the milk into the mugs. He passes one to Steve.

Steve accepts it and is quiet for a long time. He doesn’t sip from the mug, just cradles it in his hands. James thinks he remembers that too- that Steve hadn’t liked the taste or the texture of warm milk but the heat had been comforting.

“Yes,” Steve says finally.

James has been expecting that answer, has been since the moment he saw the video at the Smithsonian and felt the sense of _wrong_. But his expectation isn’t the same as hearing the confirmation from Steve’s lips and he jerks in surprise.

“Really?” he asks.

Steve laughs a little. “Sorry,” he says. “You just- you sounded like him.” James finds that he doesn’t mind the thought. “Yeah, we were.”

“Then why wasn’t _that_ in the museum?”

Steve knows immediately what he’s thinking of and the smile drops from his face. James is sorry to see it go. “Because we weren’t by the time I found you at Azzano,” he explains quietly.

James has done a bit of research on soulmates over the last month, trying to figure out the mark on his metal arm but he hasn’t heard of anyone being and then not being soulmates. Steve must see the confusion on his face because he explains- about them being born with the robin on their wrists, about finding each other, about Steve’s mark changing with the serum but Bucky’s staying the same, even about the distance growing between them by the time Bucky fell. Then he rolls up his sleeve and shows it to James and James can’t help but stare open-mouthed at Steve’s mark.

Because- because they’re still the _same_.

Frantically, he tugs at his own sleeve. Steve reaches out to stop him, worry making him say, “Bucky-” but James moves out of his reach. Finally, he yanks his sleeve up, rending a large tear in the material as he does. He scratches at his wrist, flaking off the last of the paint, and then holds it out to show him.

“Stevie, you punk,” he says, the words coming easier than they have in seventy years, “we’re still soulmates.”

Steve breathes out hard through his nose, wide-eyed gaze fixed on the phoenix mark on James’ metal wrist. He reaches out as though to touch it and then yanks his hand back. James appreciates the concern, the consideration, but right now he wants to be held. He wants to be _loved_ like he hasn’t been in decades.

He moves into Steve’s space and pulls him into a hug. Immediately, Steve’s arms encircle him, clutching him as tightly as he can. James thinks he’s lucky he’s enhanced or else this would definitely hurt. But he can’t complain because, for the first time in seventy years, he feels right.

“James,” Steve sobs out.

He buries his head in the crook of Steve’s neck and says, “Call me Bucky.”

* * *

His problems don’t immediately go away. His memories don’t instantly come back. But they do start returning faster, evidently having just waited for the return of his soulmate. He remembers getting hot dogs at Coney Island and he buys six hot dogs- three for himself and three for Steve- at the Missouri State Fair. He remembers countless nights spent sharing Steve’s bed (because his was bigger) and he asks Steve to sleep with him again. He remembers soft, early morning kisses and finds himself absentmindedly dropping a kiss on Steve’s forehead during breakfast.

It’s different, of course it is. When they’d lived in the little apartment in Brooklyn, they’d had to keep waking up in the middle of the night from Steve’s coughs or sniffles. Now, it’s Bucky’s nightmares. Back then, it had been Bucky who asked Steve to dance to the radio in their kitchen. Now, it’s Steve who asks. Once, it had been Bucky who looked out for Steve. Now, it’s Steve looking out for Bucky.

But they find themselves settling into their new normal easily like it had never been any different.

Their second first kiss happens on the porch at sunrise, almost three months after Bucky arrived. They go running every morning before dawn and then sit on the front porch swing to watch the sunrise. This morning is like every other morning, except for how Steve had quickly gone upstairs to grab his sketchbook. He’s sitting beside Bucky now, tracing the dawning morning with quick, sure lines. Bucky finds himself more arrested by the sight of Steve than he does by the sun.

“Hey, Stevie,” he begins and then stops. Steve glances up at him, back down at his sketchbook, and then up again, clearly seeing something serious in his eyes.

Bucky doesn’t quite know how to continue but he knows that it has to be him to make the first move. He reaches forward, cupping Steve’s cheeks in his palms, and softly kisses him. It’s like opening the first gift at Christmas. It’s like coming home. It’s like- it’s like finding your soulmate.

It’s perfect.

The kiss is gentle and chaste for all of about two seconds. Then Steve’s lips part on a gasp. Bucky takes the opportunity to slide his tongue into Steve’s mouth, deepening the kiss, taking the time to relearn Steve all over again. Steve moans as their tongues touch. Then he’s tossing the sketchbook aside. One arm slides around Bucky’s waist, the other moves to cradle his head, and then he’s pushing Bucky back against the side of the swing. The swing creaks but it’s peripheral in his mind as Steve moves to cover him.

For a moment, he tenses, every instinct screaming not to allow anyone to cover him. But then Steve pulls back slightly and turns his head slightly to press a sweet kiss to Bucky’s mark and he just- melts.

“That’s it, Buck,” Steve murmurs and moves forward to kiss him again. This too is both familiar and new. Steve has always been the one to seize control in their relationship but back then, it had been tinged with an edge of desperation like he had to prove himself; now, he’s nothing but confident as he reduces Bucky to a shaking mess.

They kiss until the sun has risen, until they hear noises coming from the kitchen inside. Only then does Steve pull back. His eyes are so dilated they’re more black than blue and his lips are bruised and swollen. Bucky smiles.

This is what he’s been missing.

* * *

Laura needs groceries so Bucky offers to take the truck into town to pick them up. Steve offers to go with him. As it turns out, only about half of the items they need are in town. The rest are only available at one of those fancy specialty stores in the closest city. They call Laura to ask how urgent the groceries are and when she tells them not at all, they tell her they’re going to make a day trip out of the grocery shopping and plan to be back late. She tells them to have fun, suggests a few activities for them to do, and then hangs up.

It’s well past moonrise when they get back. Usually, by this time, the house would be dark and silent but it’s not. Most of the lights are still on and there’s shouting coming from the house.

Bucky’s still for only a moment and then he jolts into action. He reaches into the glove compartment for the loaded pistol Clint keeps in the truck. Beside him, Steve is pulling his shield out of the canvas bag in the back seat. Then they’re moving as one toward the house.

It’s only once they’re on the porch that they see the empty Iron Man suit standing sentry in the corner.

Steve relaxes immediately, lowering the shield to his side. Bucky does not do the same. He still hears yelling inside the house. He can feel the Asset clambering to be let out, telling him that there’s a threat they can take care of, but Steve clearly thinks it’s not a threat so he shoves the Asset back down for now.

Even so, he doesn’t drop the gun as he pushes the door open. He could mostly hear the words outside but now they’re perfectly clear.

“-can’t ask them to come back!” Clint is shouting.

“I’m not asking them to!” the other person, presumably Stark, yells back. “I wouldn’t do that to Barnes.”

“What, so you’re here to ask Steve to go then, to just leave-”

“No! God, Clint, would you just listen? I know that Rogers-” Stark cuts off. Out of the corner of his eye, Bucky sees Steve wince. In a quieter tone, Stark continues, “I know that Steve made his choice. I don’t fault him for that.”

“I don’t get it, Tony. You come here babbling about HYDRA weapons-” Both Bucky and Steve tense at the words.

“-because I’m asking if _you_ will come back.”

There’s silence in the living room.

“Me?”

“You, birdbrain.”

“What do you think I can tell you about a bunch of missing weapons?”

“I don’t care about the missing weapons. What’s left of SHIELD can track those down. We’ve got bigger things on our plate.” Stark lowers his voice further like he’s trying to keep anyone else from listening in. “Thor came back from London yesterday. Asked us where Loki’s scepter is.”

Beside Bucky, Steve goes very still.

Clint starts to ask, “It didn’t go with- SHIELD took it.”

“Yeah, and now it’s missing.” There’s a pause. “Clint, I wouldn’t ask if we had any other choice but you know more about the scepter than any of us. Bruce and I can track it all day long but if we don’t know what it _does_ …”

Clint sighs. “Damn you saving the world types.”

Stark snorts. “Soon as we’re done, you can come back out here to your farm and your lovely family. I’m highly offended you didn’t tell me about them by the way. I thought you loved me, Legolas.”

Clint laughs. “You keep thinking that, Stark. Yeah, I’ll come back. Just gotta grab my bow, say bye to the kids. You know how it is.”

“I don’t actually,” Stark says. “Because I refuse to have little gremlins.”

Clint laughs again. Bucky’s mind is racing. HYDRA has weapons. HYDRA has high-powered, _unique_ weapons. The Avengers are going after HYDRA, who stole him and tortured him and used him.

Bucky barges in. “If you’re going after HYDRA, I want in.”

Stark yelps, hands going up in the classic Iron Man pose, which would be a lot more threatening if he were actually wearing the suit. Clint pulls the handgun from his waistband. Bucky is phased by neither of them and repeats, staring at Clint, “I want in.”

Clint narrows his eyes, searching Bucky’s expression. Bucky matches him, knowing that he’s looking for any sign that he’s not ready for this. But he is. He wants to strike back at the people who stole seventy years from him any way he can.

“Okay,” Clint says eventually.

“No, not okay,” Stark says immediately. For the first time, Bucky turns his full attention on him.

His first, somewhat foolish, thought is that Tony Stark is _tiny_.

His second thought is that, tiny or not, Stark’s fury is quelling.

“You’re not coming,” Stark continues. “You’re a recovering, ex-brainwashed assassin and it’s probably bad for your mental health if you come with us.”

“Is that what your therapist says?” Clint asks, clearly amused.

Stark turns his glare on him. “Maybe,” he allows. “But the point still stands and since Rogers isn’t coming, that makes me team leader and I say- _Steve_.”

The last word comes out as little more than a breath. Stark is staring past Bucky with this heartbreakingly sad look on his face. He’s a little afraid to turn to see Steve’s expression but he does anyway. Steve is looking back at him with an expression almost as devastated.

What has Stevie been up to since he fell?

But Steve pulls himself together, face set in that mulishly stubborn expression Bucky knows so well, and says, “We’re both coming.” Then he grins slyly, even if seems to be a front for the pain Bucky can still see in his eyes. “And, as I recall, the Avengers charter names Captain America as-”

“Hey!” Stark exclaims, pointing at him. “Unfair! You can’t use the charter against me.”

“As the leader,” Steve finishes ruthlessly, “and I say that if Bucky thinks he’s ready to come back, then he can. Now, Shellhead, would I ever lead you astray?”

He blinks innocently at Stark who glares at him. “Those missions in Istanbul and Rome say ‘yes.’”

Steve gasps. “Those weren’t my fault!”

“I was a girl, Rogers! For a week!”

“If it’s any consolation,” Bucky pipes up, sensing that the bantering could probably go on for a while, “I’m sure you were a very pretty girl.”

Stark gapes at him. Then, as Steve breaks into a broad grin, he starts to giggle. Before long, he’s all out howling with laughter and the tension in the room shatters.

“You didn’t tell me he was funny,” he tells Steve. He looks back at Bucky. “Are you sure you want to do this? Could be a lot of bad memories down this road.”

Bucky nods stubbornly. “Got a lotta bad memories anyway. Can’t be any worse than what I’m already seeing.”

Stark eyes him curiously and he wonders if he knows that the Winter Soldier killed his parents. But he eventually nods. “If you’re sure,” he says. He glances back at Clint and Steve. “You’ve still got the jet, right? Just wanted to make sure I don’t have to send one for you.”

“You flying back now?” Clint asks.

Stark shrugs. “Got a morning meeting with R&D. Could skip it but they almost blew up the lab last week and I want to yell at them about it.”

“You blow up your lab all the time,” Steve points out.

“Yeah but I’m blowing up just me, not a bunch of interns who don’t deserve to get blown up in their second week,” Stark replies with a sharp smile. “Take as much time as you need- or don’t, actually. I’d like to see you back at the tower within a week.”

And then he pushes past Steve and is gone.

* * *

Avengers Tower is everything Bucky had dreamed the future would be.

It’s got automated doors and a display of a hovering car in the lobby and a robot butler (“Artificial Intelligence butler,” Steve says. “That’s even better!” Bucky tells him, who remembers reading about AI during a long stakeout in Bucharest in 1973.) who talks to them in the elevator and tells them to stand still so he can scan their eyes.

“You know, eye scans can be hacked,” Bucky informs them.

“Yeah, we know,” Clint says with a grimace. There’s probably a story behind that. “That’s why it’s the only scan he tells you about. Not even Nat knows all the verifications JARVIS runs on us.”

Bucky is dutifully impressed.

“Sir would like to know if you need him to show you around or if you can do it yourselves,” JARVIS says. Bucky assumes he’s talking about Stark.

“Is he working on a project?” Steve asks.

“He is upgrading the Iron Man armor and has requested not to be disturbed.”

“Sounds like a workshop binge,” Steve mutters. “JARVIS, when’s the last time he ate?”

“Miss Romanoff brought him lunch two hours ago and glared at him until he ate it.”

Clint laughs. “Common room it is then.”

“Very well.”

For a moment, Bucky thinks the elevator is broken. Then he leans back against the wall and realizes he can feel the minute vibrations of the elevator rising. It’s just such a smooth ride that he didn’t even notice they were moving.

The future is _great_.

Clint splits off from them the moment they enter the common room and he sees the Black Widow sitting on one of the couches, watching some trashy reality show. “Ooh, Keeping Up with the Kardashians,” Clint says and vaults over the couch to join her. She wraps an arm around his shoulders.

“You were gone too long,” she says. She glances over her shoulder and sees Bucky. “Barnes.”

“Romanoff,” he replies flatly, remembering how hard she tried to kill him in D.C. She’s probably remembering the time he shot her.

“Play nice, guys,” Steve sighs. “Where’s Sam?”

“At the VA,” Romanoff says. “He wanted to get a job. Said he didn’t like freeloading off of Tony.”

“What does that make you then?” Clint teases.

“Hey, I had a job. Not my fault it crashed into the Potomac.” But she’s smiling fondly as she says it. Bucky misses that kind of camaraderie.

“You hungry?” Steve asks softly. “Or do you want to keep going?”

Bucky tears his attention away from the pair on the couch and says, “Keep going.”

They start with the common room floors (and yes, there’s multiple) with the state-of-the-art kitchens and the multiple TV rooms (Thor is in one of them, playing something on the Wii- he waves cheerfully at them) and the training rooms and gyms. There’s two ranges and a few rooms that Bucky doesn’t know the purpose of.

“Group bonding,” Steve explains. “We used to go out for bonding exercises but we caused too much damage so Tony built us facilities here.” He points inside the darkened room they’re standing outside of. “That one’s for laser tag.”

They continue the tour through the personal floors.

“Each Avenger has a _floor_?” Bucky asks.

Steve shrugs like that’s not weird. “Tony wanted to make it suites, keep us all together on one floor, you know? But there’s a lotta strong personalities on this team. I thought we needed a way to have a private space. Actually- JARVIS, does Bucky have a floor as well?”

“Sir thought you would want to share a floor though there are, of course, two bedrooms,” JARVIS says from a speaker that Bucky thinks might be in the ceiling. He’s proud that he doesn’t flinch.

They drop their bags off in their room (though it looks more like Steve’s room at the moment) and keep going. Their floor has a kitchen and living room like the common floor but then it also has a small library and an art studio. Bucky suspects those are personal touches that the others might not have.

They trail back down through the building, this time stopping at the labs. Steve apparently wants to introduce him to Banner but he’s not in the labs. They ask JARVIS where he is and, upon finding out he’s in Stark’s basement workshop, head for the elevator.

Only, when they get there, they both stop dead coming out of the elevator. Bucky’s arrested by the sight of the workshop. He knows that Stark is a genius but no one’s bothered to tell him that his workshop is magic in all but name.

Blue light dances over every surface, illuminating projects and plans. There’s a mockup of some sort of scepter on a table- presumably the missing one- with a series of spectra next to it and a map that has glowing blue pins stuck in it. There are robots and a wall displaying the Iron Man armors and a set of classic cars that Bucky kind of wants to drool over.

“So this is the future,” he murmurs.

Next to him, Steve makes a strangled sort of noise. Bucky faces him, wondering what’s got his attention because it can’t be the workshop. Steve’s seen that before. He follows his gaze to- _oh_.

Stark is indeed working on the armor but Bucky suspects Steve’s not staring at that. No, he thinks Steve is staring at what Stark is wearing- or rather, not wearing- because Stark is half-dressed in the armor and half-dressed in a tank top and the tiniest shorts known to mankind. He’s got one hip cocked at an angle so he can reach at one of the armor’s joints with a screwdriver and see what he’s doing. He looks- well, he looks a lot like one of those pictures the pilots used to paint on their airplanes during the war.

Bucky looks back at Steve, whose eyes are a little dilated and mouth a little open, and everything clicks in his mind- the way Steve had smiled when he said Stark’s name, the late-night phone call, the look in Stark’s eyes when he saw them. He tells himself he’s not jealous. He’s _not_. It would be terrible of him to be jealous for Steve moving on when he had thought Bucky was dead.

He reaches for Steve’s arm and pulls him back into the elevator before Stark can see them. Steve sort of collapses against the back wall after the doors close, huffing out a sigh. There are two possibilities here. Bucky thinks that either one is equally likely.

“How long were you together?” Bucky asks quietly.

“We weren’t,” Steve says, sounding tired.

It’s the second possibility then. “But you wanted to.”

“But I wanted to.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you catch the obligatory Stan Lee cameo?
> 
> If you're interested, come talk to me on tumblr at iam93percentstardust.tumblr.com :) I reblog lots of mcu stuff and occasionally I even post my own headcanons.


	4. Give Them All One Hell of a Show

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Bucky Barnes meets the Avengers, becomes a superhero, and realizes why Steve fell in love with Tony (and in which the Asset finds the man from his dreams)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for explicit sexual content about halfway through the chapter occurring right after the interview
> 
> Me: googles if "baby" was a term of endearment in the 1940s and what phone apps were popular in late 2014
> 
> Also me: knows that talk shows don't work like this and decided not to care

Steve offers to stick around and help Bucky unpack but Bucky shoos him away. He doesn’t really need the help and he kind of wants the time alone. He hasn’t been alone since HYDRA fell; he sort of misses the privacy. He unpacks his bag and then, for good measure, unpacks Steve’s too. To his immense surprise, Steve still has things here. Steve’s told him that he’d moved most of his belongings to his D.C. apartment after leaving the Tower but he hadn’t quite realized that “most” didn’t mean “all.” He wonders if Steve had always hoped that he would be able to return to the Tower soon.

His mind returns to what he saw in the basement, the want in Steve’s eyes and the affection lurking behind it. He can’t really blame Steve for moving on. After all, for all intents and purposes, he had been dead. To wish that Steve would never find love again seems cruelly possessive to him.

But that still presents a problem. Feelings don’t just disappear because they’re no longer convenient. He knows that Steve still has feelings for Stark just as Stark, from what he’s seen, has feelings for Steve. He knows also that those feelings aren’t going away anytime soon- and therein lies the problem because Bucky doesn’t share. Steve is _his_ , his soulmate, his lover, his everything. He has no intention of stepping aside just because Stark didn’t make his move fast enough.

He’s still pondering this problem when Clint sticks his head in. “You hungry?” he asks. “Wilson’s making dinner. Nat says you won’t want to miss that.”

Bucky nods absently and joins him. “Hey, Clint?” he asks as they’re waiting for the elevator. “What’s going on between Stark and Steve?”

Clint stills. “I don’t think I’m the right person to talk to about that,” he replies.

“I don’t think Stevie’s likely to tell me,” Bucky points out dryly. Clint just shrugs.

“No, I know that. I actually meant you should ask Nat. She was here for most of it.”

Bucky doubts that Romanoff is likely to tell him anything based on her cool greeting this morning. But everything about Clint’s body language screams that he doesn’t want to talk about it so he lets the subject drop. He’ll figure it out himself if he has to.

The elevator opens up onto one of the common floors (that boggles Bucky’s mind- that there’s multiple common floors). This one’s mostly an open kitchen and dining area. He glances nervously at the floor-to-ceiling windows noting the locations of nearby rooftops.

“It’s okay,” Clint murmurs. “Those windows are reflective and the glass is made of the strongest polymer on earth. No sniper’s getting through here.”

Bucky kind of doubts that but the sound of a wooden spoon smacking a hand arrests his attention, especially when Steve yelps immediately afterwards.

“I just wanted to try it,” he protests, cradling his wounded hand to his chest.

“It’s not ready yet,” a man replies archly, going back to stirring his sauce. Bucky recognizes this one. He’d been with Steve and Romanoff in D.C.

He can’t stop himself from laughing at the pouting expression on Steve’s face. Steve immediately whips around, face lighting up like the sun. “Bucky’ll back me up,” he says confidently. “Buck, tell him I can try the sauce.”

Bucky holds up his hands. “You’re on your own. I know better than to argue with the cook.”

Steve clutches at his heart dramatically. “Betrayed by my own soulmate,” he gasps.

Out of the corner of his eye, Bucky sees Romanoff, at the breakfast bar, wince. He turns toward her, starting to open his mouth to ask her about it, but before he can, the elevator dings. Stark and an unassuming man that he guesses is Dr. Banner exit the elevator arguing about…something.

“You’re asking me for permission to build a rooftop laboratory to study-?” Stark asks, walking backward as he talks. He’s changed out of the shorts he was wearing earlier though he’s still in the tank top. There’s a quiver full of arrows slung over his shoulder.

“Secondary organic aerosols,” Banner replies patiently. “There’s a lab in Florida that’s proposing the formation of carbonyl radicals instead of hydroxyls. I want to verify their results.”

“Why not just go to Florida?”

“Because I want to know if their results are due to their location.”

Stark thinks about that for a second. “Fair enough,” he says eventually. “Send me a requisitions form. I’ll see what I can do.”

Bucky glances around to see if anyone else is as confused as he is. Gratifyingly, everyone but Thor has a glazed expression on their face. Thor, on the other hand, is nodding along thoughtfully.

“Why should the location have any bearing on the radicals formed?” Thor asks.

“Theoretically, it shouldn’t,” Dr. Banner agrees. “But we’ve thought for decades that hydroxyl radicals are forming. To find out now that they’re actually carbonyls-”

“Could be a game changer,” Stark cuts in.

“Hey, no science at dinner,” Clint protests. “Isn’t that a rule?”

Stark says snidely, “We changed it while you were playing Happy Family.”

Clint maturely sticks his tongue out at him.

“Boys, boys,” Romanoff comments idly.

Stark shoots her an apologetic grin and says, “Nat, how’s my favorite assassin doing tonight?”

“I’m doing great,” Clint interrupts before Romanoff can reply. Both Stark and Romanoff shoot him a glare.

“Sam, Steve,” Stark continues with nods to both. He misses- or blithely ignores- the shy smile Steve gives him to swipe a finger through the sauce and neatly dodges the swat with the spoon. “Barnes, you get settled in okay?”

It takes a moment for Bucky to realize that Stark is actually talking to him. The man moves through topics so quickly that he hasn’t quite caught up. “Uh, yes,” he says quickly.

“Great,” Stark says, flashing him a quick grin. Bucky thinks it looks too bright, almost false. “You meet the team yet?”

He shrugs because he’d sort of met Romanoff and Thor earlier that afternoon though it had been little more than a quick stop and a greeting on the tour. Stark marches over and sticks out his hand.

“Hi, I’m Tony,” he says.

“Really? You’re doing that?” Romanoff says.

“Shut up, Nat,” Stark hisses at her.

Part of Bucky- the part that’s a little upset Steve had moved on- wants to tell Stark to keep calling him “Barnes.” But that’s petty and rude to do to the person housing them. Instead, he shakes his hand. “Bucky.”

“That’s Nat.” Stark jerks a thumb at her. “Thor, god of thunder.”

“Wait. Like the actual Norse god of thunder?” Bucky asks incredulously.

Thor grins wolfishly. “Aye.”

“I know you already know Clint,” Stark continues. “Don’t know if you remember Sam Wilson.”

“I remember you,” Bucky says. “You kicked me in the back. Twice.”

Wilson glares at him. “Yeah, well, you pushed me off a helicarrier. And you ripped the steering wheel out of my car.”

Bucky doesn’t remember doing either of those but it wouldn’t surprise him. He knows how much strength is in his metal arm and how vicious the Winter Soldier had been. Both are perfectly feasible to the Asset.

“And this is my BFF- the kids are still saying that, right?- my science bro, the light of my life-”

“That’s enough, Tony,” Banner says. He gives a little wave and a tight smile. “Bruce Banner.”

“Nice to meet you all,” Bucky says quietly.

Stark turns away from him then and unslings the quiver from his back. He tosses them at Clint. “Made these for you,” he says. “Let me know what you think.”

Clint runs a reverent hand over the quiver. “Oh baby, I’ve missed you,” he says.

“Yeah I know,” Stark replies with a smirk. “You though, I haven’t missed at all.”

Clint reaches over to shove him. Stark sidesteps him and Clint nearly falls over. He shoots an irritated glare at Stark. “You know, I could test one of these arrows right now.”

Stark ducks behind Banner. “No killing Antoshka,” Romanoff says and plucks the quiver out of Clint’s hands.

“Aw, arrows,” Clint laments.

* * *

They brief the next morning, Stark and Banner leading the discussion about the scepter. They’re seamless together, easily following each other’s sentences without the slightest pause and seeming to understand each other’s thoughts with the briefest glance. If it wasn’t for the fact that Banner’s wrist is adorned with a soft orange flower and Stark’s is blank, Bucky might have thought them to be soulmates.

“Is it Asgardian?” Romanoff asks.

“No,” Thor says, shaking his head. “I do not know where Loki found it but it isn’t one of our relics.”

“Could Loki give us any more information about the scepter?” Steve asks. On the other side of the table, Stark frantically shakes his head and Banner lets out a quiet groan. Steve looks confused.

Thor bows his head. “My brother passed on during the battle with the Dark Elves.”

Awkwardly, Steve says, “I’m sorry to hear that.”

Bucky notices that Clint doesn’t look sorry at all.

Stark motions at Clint. “That’s why we asked you to come in. With Loki-” He pauses to glance at Thor. “With Loki…gone, you’re the best source we’ve got on the scepter.” Clint nods shortly.

“If that’s all taken care of,” Stark begins. Romanoff clears her throat and passes him a piece of paper. Stark glances at it and says, “Oh yeah. Barnes, you still want to be an Avenger, right?”

That’s not really what Bucky wants to do but he suspects they won’t let him help bring down HYDRA if he says no so he just nods.

“You got a handle on the Winter Soldier thing?”

He has no idea if he does or not. He hasn’t tried to bring out the Asset since he started getting his memories back. Even so, he nods again.

“Great. Any objections to making Barnes a probationary Avenger?”

“Hold on,” Steve says. “Probationary? We’ve never had a probationary status before.”

Stark glances at Romanoff. “Some of us are worried about Barnes’ past,” he says carefully.

“That wasn’t Bucky’s fault,” Steve argues hotly.

“We know,” Romanoff says soothingly. “But we _don’t_ know what HYDRA did, if there are trigger words to make him compliant or if he can be activated. We have to be careful, Steve. A lot of people already aren’t happy about SHIELD. We don’t want to hurt the people we’re trying to protect.”

Bucky can see that Steve’s trying to think of another argument. He lays a calming hand on his shoulder. “It’s okay, Stevie,” he says quietly. “I don’t mind.”

“They don’t trust you,” he says.

Bucky shrugs. “Didn’t your Ma always say trust is earned? So I’ll earn it.”

He thinks Romanoff might be hiding a smile behind her hand. “It’s not forever,” Stark says. “And if it turns out HYDRA did something else to you, we’ll figure out how to fix it and then you can take it out on them.”

Startled, he glances up at Stark, who just winks at him. He can’t stop himself from grinning. “Sounds good,” he says.

The others are filing out of the room when Stark asks, “Barnes, could you hold back a sec?”

Steve stops too. Bucky waves him on. He doubts that Stark’s going to attack him in Avengers Tower and even if he did…well, brainwashed or not, he did kill Stark’s parents. Stark would be absolutely justified in attacking him.

“I’m sorry,” he says once the room’s empty.

“For what?” Stark asks, a crinkle in his brow like he’s genuinely confused.

Bucky’s eyes narrow. “For killing your-” he begins slowly.

“Oh, that,” Stark interrupts, grimacing. “Like Steve said, it wasn’t your fault. You know that, right? Everything HYDRA made you do- that wasn’t you.” He pauses. “Did you think I wanted to yell at you about that?”

Bucky doesn’t quite know what to say to that. He shrugs helplessly.

Stark scrubs a hand over his face. “Of course you do,” he mutters. “Look, I just wanted to ask you to come down to the lab when you get the chance. I’ve got some stuff for you.”

“From the war?” he asks. Bucky’s seen the things that Stark had given Steve- the old radio from their living room, the paintings from the bedroom, even the mirror that used to hang above the bathroom sink.

“Ah, sorry, no,” Stark says with a small frown. “Howard only collected Steve’s things. Why? Is there something you want me to find?” He holds up a hand before Bucky can reply. “Not the point. I actually meant I’ve got gear for you- armor, comm unit, that kind of thing. Couple guns- Steve said you were a sniper so I made an exception for you.”

“Exception?”

Stark waves his hand, already walking out the door. “Yeah, I used to make weapons. Stopped a few years ago. Long story. Anyway, just swing by the lab when you’re free. JARVIS will let you in.”

And then he’s gone and Bucky’s left with a very memorable impression of the first full conversation he has with Tony Stark.

* * *

He doesn’t make the trip down to Stark’s lab that day or even the next. He’s sure he’s supposed to but he doesn’t feel ready. Instead, he takes a few days to sort himself out. He settles into a schedule- running in the morning with Steve, afternoon training sessions with the rest of the team, and spending his free time catching up on the things he missed when he was working for HYDRA.

The first few nights, he and Steve spend a quiet evening on their floor, eating dinner and then watching a movie before going to bed. Then, as they’re in the elevator headed down for their morning run, they meet Stark.

The man’s dressed in a three piece suit that, admittedly, looks very good on him. He looks over the rim of his sunglasses at them and says, “You two look gorgeous. Must be my lucky day.” But it sounds tired like his heart isn’t in it.

For an awkward moment, there’s silence in the elevator. Stark pulls out his phone and taps at it. Steve rocks a little on his heels. Bucky wishes he were anywhere but here.

“Missed you at dinner last night; Bruce made masala dosa,” Stark says suddenly as he slides his phone back into his pocket. “Actually, missed you at dinner every night.”

It hadn’t occurred to Bucky that the team might actually spend their evenings together. But now that he’s thinking about it, he doesn’t know how he missed it. Team meals are an excellent way to promote trust and camaraderie. The Howling Commandos had had shared dinners and hadn’t the Avengers even had a team meal the first night he arrived? He raises his brows at Steve questioningly.

Steve gives him a small shrug. “I just wanted to keep you to myself a little longer,” he admits, a sheepish blush on his face. It’s so adorable that Bucky can’t stop himself from leaning over and kissing his cheek. Stark turns away.

* * *

The thing is, Steve’s never been a shallow man, a result of growing up small and sickly. Stark _is_ handsome but for Steve to have fallen for him as hard as he did, he must have seen something else in him. Something that the general public missed.

Bucky wants to know what it is. He wants to know what captured the heart of his soulmate. He doesn’t blame Steve for moving on. He had, after all, thought Bucky was dead. It would be cruel of him to wish misery on Steve. But he’s curious and perhaps just a tiny bit jealous that Stark has a part of Steve that he doesn’t have.

So he waits for JARVIS to tell him that Stark’s back from his meeting and then goes down to the lab. It’s as magical as it was the last time Bucky had been down there. Stark’s already there too, looking much the same as he had this morning in the elevator, only he’s shed the jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves. Bucky has the fleeting thought that he looks exactly like one of those movie stars from the ‘40s.

He goes to open the door and it beeps at him, an angry red light flashing from a keypad beside the door.

“Sir has taken the liberty of programming your passcode as Captain Rogers’ birthday,” JARVIS says.

Bucky nods absently and types in 070418. The light flashes green as there’s an audible click from the door. He pushes it open only to be assaulted with the loudest- well, Bucky wouldn’t call it music but he doesn’t know what else it is. He moves to cover his ears but the music cuts off.

“What the fuck, J?” Stark complains.

“Apologies, Sir, but you have a visitor.”

Stark whirls around and grins broadly at the sight of Bucky, though Bucky notices that the smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Barnes,” he says delightedly. “Glad to see you made it.”

He ushers him over to a table and hands him a scrap of fabric. “Body armor,” he says.

“Does it unfold?” Bucky asks.

Stark, having already moved on to the next item on the table, pauses. “No,” he says. “It’s expensive to make so it’s just that square. I want you to test it. Bring it back to me if there’s anything wrong with it. I’ll fabricate the rest of it once you’re happy with it. Now, are you attached to the whole HYDRA look or do you want a new uniform?”

He brings up a virtual schematic, impressing Bucky with the ease with which he manipulates the design. He makes some sort of motion with his hand and the design expands to nearly life-size.

“Take a look,” Stark says, taking a step back.

It’s similar to HYDRA’s design but it’s less- dark, somehow. Stark kept the left arm sleeveless but he ditched the straps running across the torso. He’s thrown in a few silver and red accents instead of the straight black. It doesn’t look foreboding. Instead, he looks like a hero.

“This’ll do,” he says quietly, trying to hide how much he wants to cry. Stark glances at him and then quickly glances away so he figures he probably wasn’t very successful.

“We can keep going later,” Stark says gently.

He looks over at Stark, who’s turned back to him with an understanding expression. Bucky’s glad it isn’t pity. Sometimes Steve looks at him with this horrible mix of guilt and pity in his eyes. He wants to be sick every time he sees it. What happened to him was awful but it hadn’t been Steve’s fault. It hadn’t been _anyone’s_ fault except for HYDRA’s. It was just bad luck. He wishes Steve could see that.

“I wanna do this now,” he says. Stark nods and picks up a tiny earbud to hand it to him. “Stark- I- thank you.”

Stark’s hands still on a small pistol. After a moment, he clears his throat and says, “Thought I told you to call me Tony.”

Bucky knows an offering when he sees one. “Yeah and I told you to call me Bucky so I guess neither of us gets what we want.”

There’s a glimmer of amusement in Stark’s eyes when he takes the comm unit out of Bucky’s hands and replaces it with the pistol. “How about Buckaroo?” 

* * *

Clint had warned Bucky that Tony was prone to giving people nicknames but he hadn’t quite realized the breadth of his ability to come up with them. Now that the floodgates have opened, there’s no stopping them.

He calls Bucky Buckaroo, Tasty Freeze, Manchurian Candidate (only to decide that he hated it and never used it again), Bucky Bear (and on one memorable occasion, Bucky Babe), and more.

Bucky’s favorite though happens about two months after that first day in the workshop.

He wakes from a nightmare in the middle of the night, shivering despite the extra blankets on the bed. Usually, when this happens, he wakes up Steve and lets Steve cuddle him until he can fall back asleep. But Bucky’s woken him up multiple times every night for the last week. He knows that the serum means Steve doesn’t have to sleep as much but he’s starting the see the toll that Bucky’s nightmares are taking. He doesn’t want to wake him yet again.

Instead, he wanders out to the communal kitchen, thinking to try the warm milk and crackers remedy. The milk is just barely starting to heat up when he hears a soft, sleepy “James?”

He turns slightly to see a sleep-rumpled Tony standing in the doorway. He’s dressed in sleep pants, slung low on his hips, and a threadbare MIT shirt. Tony rubs at his eyes, still looking more asleep than awake.

 _Adorable_ , Bucky thinks and then remembers that he’s not supposed to think that.

“What are you doing up?” Tony asks, padding into the kitchen. He leans up against a counter and eyes the milk in the saucepan.

“Nightmares,” Bucky says shortly. He doesn’t really want to talk about them. “What about you?”

Tony shrugs. “Nightmares. Was looking for Natasha but she’s not in her room.”

“She and Wilson answered a distress call last night,” Bucky says. He stirs the milk once and then reaches for the crackers. Tony wouldn’t have known they were gone. He’d been in Japan until a few hours ago.

“Oh,” Tony says forlornly. He wraps his arms around himself, looking a little lost.

Bucky looks at him curiously. He’s not surprised that Tony has nightmares. The life of a superhero isn’t easy and he’s known since the moment he saw the glowing thing in his chest and asked Steve about it that Tony’s been through a lot. He _is_ surprised that he’s looking for Natasha. He hadn’t thought that they were together. Up until this point, Bucky hasn’t really looked at anyone’s soulmarks and, what with winter approaching, none of them really walk around in short sleeves anyway. Sam, he knows, has been markless since Riley’s death. Clint shares a speeding arrow with Laura. But he doesn’t know about the others.

“Are you two- ya know?” he asks and gestures at his wrist.

“Why does everyone think that?” Tony mutters. He holds out his wrist. It’s blank. Tony’s markless.

“I’m sorry,” he replies quietly.

“Not your fault,” Tony says.

“How long?”

Tony smiles wistfully. “A very long time.”

Bucky doesn’t know what to say to that. It doesn’t really seem fair that he found his soulmate in both lifetimes- by two different soulmarks- but Tony doesn’t even have one.

“For the record,” Tony adds. “Nat and I aren’t a thing. We just like to cuddle when we can’t sleep.”

He turns to go and then pauses at the door. “You’re welcome to join us if you don’t feel like waking Steve.”

Bucky stares after him for a long moment. He shouldn’t follow him. He’s got Steve, the world’s most perfect soulmate, waiting in his bed. He shouldn’t ask for anything else. He shouldn’t _need_ anything- anyone- else. But Tony had called him James in that soft, sweet voice and something had clicked inside him. It had felt right in a way that he didn’t really understand. Tony had nightmares; he’d known trauma. He’d been captured and tortured until he’d said yes to his kidnappers. Maybe it had always been a trick to build the Iron Man suit but Bucky, who sometimes wonders if he’d said yes to becoming the Winter Soldier to stop the pain, wonders if Tony, a civilian, had ever been tempted to build the weapons.

He shouldn’t follow him but he does.

* * *

It’s just the two of them that first night. They start out pressed back to back but Bucky doesn’t like having his back to anyone. When he sleeps with Steve, he doesn’t mind as much because it’s _Steve_ but he’s not at that stage with Tony. He tries to settle his mind, relax his body, but he can’t. He holds himself still, not wanting to disturb Tony.

“This isn’t working,” Tony says. “Roll over.”

Bucky doesn’t jump but he will admit that he’s a little startled to realize that Tony had been awake.

“Roll over,” Tony says again, more impatiently. Bucky does and then stares in disbelief as Tony wiggles backward until he’s pressed along Bucky’s front. Cautiously, he rests his hand on Tony’s side. When Tony doesn’t move away, he slides his arm over until he’s holding him against him. The thing that had clicked when Tony had said his name settles further into place.

“Better?” Tony asks around a yawn.

Bucky hides his nod against Tony’s hair. 

* * *

He’s back at Tony’s door three days later, hand raised to knock. But he can’t bring himself to actually knock. What if Tony’s asleep? He doesn’t want to wake him up and he certainly doesn’t want to seem needy. He doesn’t know how often Tony has nightmares; maybe it’s as often as he does and maybe it’s not. But if Tony doesn’t have them as often as Bucky, he doesn’t want to look pathetic by needing to stay with Tony so many times.

The choice is taken out of his hands when Romanoff comes up behind him. “He won’t mind,” she says quietly. “You don’t even have to knock.”

And to demonstrate, she slips past him and opens the door. To his surprise, she doesn’t immediately enter. Instead, she waits for him to go through. She watches as he settles down behind Tony, spooning him the way he had the first time. It’s only then that she moves to the other side of Tony, brushing his hair out of his eyes and kissing his forehead before she lays down.

He thinks she sadly murmurs, “Oh Antoshka,” but it’s so quiet he can’t be certain.

* * *

Sometimes, it’s just Tony and Bucky. Sometimes, Natasha joins them. On particularly bad nights, Clint’s there too. When it’s _really_ bad, when Natasha and Clint see faces and Tony clutches at the reactor and Bucky doesn’t know where he is, they don’t even bother sleeping. They stay up all night and watch movies. They stagger into the communal kitchen the next morning with deep bags under their eyes, exhausted but all the better for their shared night.

Bucky thinks that Steve suspects something but he never says anything about him leaving in the middle of the night and returning to their bed before Steve awakes.

“He did once,” Natasha says when he mentions his suspicion to her. “When Tony and I first started sleeping together. I think it was the longest fight they ever had.”

It’s the most anyone’s said to him about Steve and Tony’s non-relationship. “Did he think he was using you?” he asks, aware of Tony’s reputation, however undeserved it may be.

Natasha smiles bitterly. “Tony’s too soft to use me,” she says. “He’s more likely to be used.”

He thinks that she’s trying to tell him something but he doesn’t know what.

* * *

Bucky finds himself adjusting into life at the tower far easier than he might have expected. He goes running with Sam and Steve. He trains with the team. He spends time in the workshop with Tony and often Steve.

The team itself is great. Bucky easily fits in with them. Sure, he’s not entirely certain what to make of Bruce and he doesn’t spend much time with Thor but he likes them just the same. It takes some time for Natasha to warm up to him but it’s difficult to share a bed- and nightmares- with someone and not come to like them at least a little. He gets along with Sam like a house on fire, constantly arguing but always having each other’s back when anyone else tries to butt in. Clint is as great as he’s been since the day he found Bucky at the Smithsonian. Steve is the same Steve he’s always been and Tony is quickly becoming one of Bucky’s closest friends.

It’s not that Steve is perfect because Bucky’s known him long enough to know that he’s not. It’s that he seems perfect. Captain America is untouchable and, try as he might, Bucky can’t quite forget that the last time he’d seen Steve before he fell off the train, there’d been a growing distance between them.

But Tony isn’t perfect at all. As Tony himself puts it, he’s made many, often public, mistakes. He’s flawed and broken and he, more than just about anyone else on the team, knows what Bucky’s been through.

He doesn’t mind when Bucky comes to him after a nightmare. He doesn’t mind when Bucky’s had a rough day and needs somewhere to hide and decides on the workshop. He doesn’t mind when Bucky needs someone to talk to about the Winter Soldier who isn’t going to offer him advice like Sam or remind him that it wasn’t his fault like Steve. Tony sits there and nods and, when Bucky wants it, tells him about when SI used to make weapons.

But, sometimes, there’s something about the way Tony looks at him, something wistful and longing. It only ever shows up when Bucky and Steve are together. At first, Bucky thinks that it’s because he reminds Tony of what he lost. Then he thinks that it’s because they’re soulmates and Tony’s markless. But neither explanation seems to quite fit. It’s a puzzle- one that Bucky finds himself wishing he could solve.

* * *

The Avengers are called out for four missions before Bucky joins them. It’s Sam’s suggestion, as he reminds them all of the media circus that’s bound to happen when Steve returns. Bucky, remembering Steve’s interactions with the press after Azzano, claims that he can handle it. The others firmly tell him no.

It’s only later that Sam quietly tells him that the press aren’t like what they used to be. They’re vicious and invasive, certainly not something that Bucky will want to handle when he’s still getting used to his freedom. He’s not wrong. The press converge on the team as they’re reentering the tower, demanding to know where Steve had been and why he hadn’t joined the team when the Avengers reformed after SHIELD fell and had he been feuding with one of the other Avengers- perhaps Tony?

Steve answers as vaguely as possible, telling them that he had needed some time away after Fury’s death and that he had always intended on returning to the Avengers. He says nothing about Bucky. When the reporters try to push for more answers, Tony physically shoves Steve inside the tower, informs the reporters that they will be taking no further questions at this time, and that there will be a press conference at some point in the near future to address the changes to the Avengers.

Bucky watches all of this from the giant flat screen TV in the main common room though his attention is diverted when he hears the elevator chime. Steve and Tony are arguing about the press conference when they step out of the elevator.

“You can’t tell them there’ll be a press conference when you aren’t planning one,” Steve says, shedding his gloves on one of the coffee tables.

“Who says I’m not planning one?” Tony challenges. He’d lost the armor at some point during the battle and is down to the flight suit. Bucky would be upset at how Steve’s eyes keep landing on the flight suit if it weren’t for the fact that he can’t stop staring at it either. It is _very_ tight and Tony looks _very_ good in it.

“We can’t just introduce the Winter Soldier and not expect there to be questions,” Tony continues, now chopping up ingredients for smoothies- apparently a longstanding Avengers tradition, according to Natasha. “Or Bucky Barnes for that matter.”

“Okay,” Steve concedes but he’s still got the mulish tilt to his chin. “Then you can’t say there’s going to be a press conference when you don’t know when it’ll be.”

“I’m an eccentric billionaire. I can say whatever I want.”

* * *

The night the Avengers are called out for the fourth time without him, Bucky is incapable of sleep. The team had faced some sort of sea monster and Tony, caught by a tentacle, had been pulled into the water. His comm had shorted out. He hadn’t even been able to fly his way out. Hulk had dove into the water after him, pulling him up limp and unresponsive. They’d thought he was unconscious. It hadn’t been until they pulled the faceplate off that they realized he was screaming. Natasha had been forced to sedate him so that they could get him out of the armor and back to the tower.

Bucky knows what waterboarding is, knows that the Asset had employed the technique occasionally. He’s never thought of the aftermath. It’s only now that he realizes that Tony doesn’t have that luxury.

He stands and stalks out to the living room. He can’t sleep, not when he can’t get Tony’s screams out of his head.

“Sir is still awake,” JARVIS says quietly when he reaches for the remote.

Bucky freezes. After the battle, Natasha had called in Tony’s best friends. He’d barely had the chance to say hello to Rhodes and Potts before they were hurtling off to Tony’s room. He hadn’t thought that Tony would want him around.

He heads up to Tony’s floor, unwilling to give up this chance to reassure himself that Tony’s alive. He’s sitting on the couch when Bucky arrives, watching the footage from the battle. He doesn’t even blink when Bucky sits next to him, just watches the battle with an unblinking, vacant stare that Bucky hates.

“You shouldn’t do that to yourself,” Bucky says, grabbing the remote to turn the TV off.

Tony shrugs. “Have to fix it,” he replies.

“By torturing yourself again?”

“I have to know what I did wrong.”

“Hey!” Bucky says, fear making his voice sharp. “You didn’t do anything wrong ‘cept maybe go out there when you shouldn’t have.”

“The team needed-”

“The team needs you _safe_ , doll.” He wraps his arm around Tony’s shoulders, pulling him in. He can feel him trembling still so he runs his thumb over his shoulder the way Steve does for him. Slowly, Tony starts to relax against him until he’s breathing even and deep. Bucky checks to make sure he’s asleep. Then he gently lifts Tony into his arms and carries him into his bedroom.

Potts and Rhodes are curled up together, in a way that looks like it should be uncomfortable but they seem happy. He sets Tony down beside them, his heart breaking when Tony’s hand weakly grasps at his sleeve. It isn’t right, he thinks, that Tony- who’s been nothing but sweet and kind- has no one to sleep beside him the way Potts and Rhodes do- the way Steve and Bucky do.

He goes back out to the living room and starts the playback again. He doesn’t think that there’s anything else that _Tony_ could have done but he’s wondering now if _someone else_ could have done better. He’d watched the battle as it was happening in the common room but his attention had entirely been on Steve and later on Tony.

He watches the footage another three times before he comes to the conclusion that there was nothing that the team could have done to stop Tony from going into the water. They’d been busy, too caught up in the sea monster. But if they’d had another person… Bucky knows it’s probably foolish to think that he could have made that much of a difference but there’d been a moment, just before Tony had been grabbed, where Clint had been holding the position that Bucky would normally hold and if he’d been there and Clint had been somewhere else? Well, maybe someone could have gotten to Tony sooner.

Bucky goes to Natasha the next day.

While Steve had been the leader of the Avengers at one time, he’d lost that position after going to Missouri. The position had ended up going to Natasha who still held it until the charter was up for renewal at the end of the year.

Her office door on one of the lower floors of the tower is open but he still taps on it. She looks up from the paperwork she’s filling out and smiles briefly. “Have a seat,” she says and motions at one of the plush chairs in front of her desk. “Just need to finish this.”

He sits and plays some numbers matching game on his phone that Sam had introduced him to a few weeks ago while Natasha finishes with the last of her paperwork. She viciously crosses the last t in her name, makes a triumphant noise, and practically throws the form onto a towering stack of other forms on the far side of her desk.

“What’s up?” she asks, taking a sip out of her mug before grimacing as she realizes it’s gone cold.

Bucky simply says, “I’m ready.”

It takes her a second to realize what he means. She leans back in her chair. “You are, are you?” she asks evenly. “Why now?”

Bucky was prepared for this so he asks Jarvis to throw the footage up on her computer screen. He points out where he could have helped, makes sure to mention that he might have been able to keep Tony from going into the water.

Natasha stops him about halfway through. “You’re sure you’re ready for this?” she asks. “I know Steve and Tony think so but do you?”

That’s news to Bucky, that Tony thinks he’s ready. He finds himself not wanting to let Tony down every bit as much as he doesn’t want to disappoint Steve so he nods firmly.

Natasha hums softly and then pulls a form out from her desk drawer. “Sign in the highlighted spaces please,” she says and passes him both the form and a pen. Bucky finishes the form quickly, a little afraid she might change her mind but all she does is glance over it and then tell him, “Welcome to the Avengers.”

* * *

There’s a party that night to celebrate Bucky joining the team. It’s nothing big- just the team and Rhodes and Potts- but they have pizza and drinks. It’s nice. For a long time, Bucky had thought that he wouldn’t ever find something like this again but he’s got it now.

Tony finds him and Steve toward the end of the night and hands him an envelope. “For you,” he pronounces. “And I guess it’s for Steve too but it’s your night, so it’s for you.”

Bucky opens the envelope, pretending not to notice how Tony and Steve are studiously not looking at each other. “Oh!” he says, surprised at Tony’s thoughtfulness.

Steve looks away from where he was not staring at Tony’s eyes. “What is it?” he asks curiously.

“Season tickets,” Bucky says as he slides the tickets out and hands them to Steve. “To the Mets.”

“What, couldn’t get the Dodgers?” Steve comments as he shuffles them in his hand.

“I’m not flying you two out to California every couple of days,” Tony says archly. “You can do that after you retire.”

Steve doesn’t seem to hear him. He’s staring at the tickets, looking more than a little downcast. For a moment, Bucky thinks that he’s genuinely disappointed they’re not for the Dodgers but then he quietly says, “There’s two of them.”

“Yes?” Tony says. “One for you and one for Bucky. What’s wrong with that?”

Steve furtively glances at Bucky before he says, “We used to go together.”

Bucky doesn’t get it at first. He can only remember taking Steve to that one game back in ’41. Then he looks at the blush on Tony’s face and realizes. To his surprise though, the expected jealousy doesn’t appear. Instead, he feels more sad that this is something else that the two lost when he came back.

“Come with us,” he says impulsively.

There’s a sudden flare of hope in Tony’s eyes that disappears just as quickly. “You don’t mean that,” he says.

Bucky appreciates the out Tony’s trying to give him but he doesn’t need it. He feels completely sure of this decision. “I do. Come with us,” he repeats.

“Please,” Steve adds softly.

Tony smiles shyly and ducks his head. “Okay.”

* * *

The season doesn’t start for another several months so Steve puts the two tickets on top of the fireplace. The next day, a third ticket joins them with a sticky note attached to it. It reads, “I’ll just lose it if I try to keep it so keep it for me?”

Steve doesn’t remove the note.

Neither does Bucky, though he’s not entirely certain why.

* * *

Bucky’s first mission with the team is smooth and easy. They get a tip about the scepter in Belize and are headed out within the hour. Unfortunately, the scepter isn’t there but the site is still an active HYDRA base. Natasha orders it cleared out.

The fight is over in minutes as Bucky’s experience within HYDRA proves to be invaluable. The Hulk isn’t even needed (something Bucky’s a little glad for as he hasn’t met the Hulk yet and he isn’t sure he wants to). Natasha and Clint are rounding up the criminals, moving them into the Quinjet’s holding cells, when Tony sidles up next to him.

“Hey, you remember that press conference I said we needed to talk about?” he asks.

He nods grimly. How could he forget.

“It’s time to talk about it.”

Bucky stifles a sigh if only because he knows that’s exactly what isn’t needed. He can’t seem to stop his wince though. Tony grimaces sympathetically.

“I know,” he agrees, “but I’ve talked with the PR team and we think we’ve got a way to make it easier on you. _You_ won’t be handling the press conference itself. Nat and I will do that. Look, we’re going to have to be completely transparent- about your fall, what you were doing for seventy years, even what happened to Howard. Legal’s been working to make sure that you can’t be prosecuted for anything- brainwashing’s a pretty good excuse- but prosecution’s nothing compared to what the public can do. Are you sure you’re ready for this?”

Bucky nods firmly. “I’m ready. I _am_.”

Tony looks like he was expecting that answer. “That’s my man,” he teases. “What _you_ will be doing is an interview.”

“Like with the newspaper?”

Tony chuckles. “’With the newspaper,’ he says,” he mutters. “No, on TV.” He must see Bucky’s alarmed expression because he hastily continues, “It’ll be one-on-one. No audience participation. Just you and whichever host you pick- and Steve, if you want him there.”

Having Steve there sounds nice but- “Will you be there?”

“Do you want me there?” Tony asks, looking as startled as he sounds. Bucky’s kind of reminded of a baby deer.

He does want him there. Tony’s his friend. He likes him a lot, even if he hasn’t really reached the stage of liking him as much as Steve does. If anyone were to be able to get him through an interview, it would be Tony.

“Yeah,” he says warmly, feeling gratified as Tony smiles at him. “I do.”

“Great.” Tony hands him a tablet. “Here’s a list of talk show hosts. I’d recommend steering clear of anything from Fox News. They still think that the only real couples are soulmates.” His nose wrinkles and Bucky laughs. “PR needed an answer like yesterday about which show so I’d pick one as soon as possible.”

He picks Jimmy Fallon.

Jimmy Fallon- “Call me Jimmy-” doesn’t have a mark so he’s either unbonded like Tony or is hiding it but either way, he clearly doesn’t have a problem with unbonded people. He seems pretty funny from the video clips Bucky’s seen of him. He’s not one of those conservative assholes who think that vaccines are useless and the poor deserve to starve. Best of all, when the news breaks that Bucky Barnes is alive and spent seventy years tortured into being the Winter Soldier, he immediately tweets his support of him.

“Ooh, I like Jimmy,” Clint says. “Hey Nat, remember the interview we had with Jimmy Fallon after New York?”

Natasha, patching up a small burn on Sam’s arm, grins. “Isn’t that the one where you brought a goat on stage and Tony insisted on being asked questions like ‘What are you wearing?’ and ‘Is it hard losing enough weight to fit into the flight suit?’”

“Good times,” Clint remarks fondly.

The interview begins with Tony alone with Jimmy on stage. They joke a few times, make a couple comments about past interviews Tony’s done. It’s odd, Bucky decides. He’s seen the Tony Stark persona before on TV but he’s never experienced it. He can see why people fall head over heels for this man. There’s a magnetism to him, this sense when he turns his gaze on people that tells them they’re the most special person in the room. It’s heady.

Then Jimmy says, “So you said yesterday that you’ve got not one but two supersoldiers on your team now. What’s that about?” The audience cheers.

Tony laughs and spreads his hands out a little. “What can I say? I’m starting a collection. Any volunteers can report to Stark Tower at 7 a.m. tomorrow.”

Jimmy laughs as well and says, “You hear that? You too can become a supersoldier-”

“As long as you don’t mind highly dangerous experimental medical procedures,” Tony interrupts smoothly.

“Well, as long as you don’t mind that,” Jimmy agrees. He leans forward a little. “What’s it like living with them?”

Tony shrugs. “Steve wouldn’t know the meaning of clean if it bit him on the ass and Bucky burns water. What’s not to like?” The audience laughs.

“The leaked SHIELD files said that Howard and Maria Stark were killed by HYDRA. Was-”

“I’m gonna stop you there,” Tony says impatiently. Bucky shifts a little even though he knows it’s all planned; Tony and Jimmy cleared it with him before the show. “If you’re going to ask if Bucky Barnes killed my parents, then the answer is no. Bucky was captured and tortured by men who’ve had centuries of experience in breaking good men. I’ve been where he’s been. I know how easy it is to say yes and I was only held for three months, not seventy years. So, no, Bucky didn’t kill them. HYDRA did and used the Winter Soldier to do it and I won’t let anyone say that it was his fault. Bucky Barnes is a goddamn hero and if I can say that, then none of you have any right to do less.”

Bucky’s heard it before- by Steve and Clint and Sam and even by Tony himself. But here’s Tony, whose entire adult life has been shaped by the Winter Soldier, declaring to the world that he believes in Bucky Barnes.

He kind of wants to cry but he’s pretty sure that his makeup isn’t waterproof.

Jimmy’s grinning. “You think he liked that?” he asks Tony.

Tony twists around to squint at where he and Steve are waiting backstage. “I’m pretty sure, yeah.”

“Does he need a minute?”

“Probably.”

“We’ll be right back with Captain America and the Winter Soldier- after this commercial break!”

The blinking lights on the cameras freeze and Tony’s smile slides from his face. He’s immediately up out of his seat. He races toward Bucky, anxiously saying, “Was that okay? Are you okay?”

Bucky pulls him into a hug. “Thank you,” he whispers.

“Oh,” Tony says awkwardly but his arms wrap around Bucky too. “It really wasn’t anything.”

It was but Bucky doesn’t push the issue. He knows how bad Tony is at accepting thanks.

The makeup artist pries them apart. “Really, Mr. Stark?” she grouses. “Had to ruin all my hard work.”

“You know me,” Tony says sheepishly. “I like a show.”

They’re back on air two minutes later, this time with Bucky and Steve joining Tony on the couch. Bucky’s still a little nervous but he’s got his soulmate sitting on one side of him and Tony on the other. He knows they’ll take care of him.

“Welcome back to Late Night,” Fallon begins, “and a special welcome to the twenty-first century for America’s second supersoldier, Bucky Barnes!”

“I mean, I’ve been to the twenty-first century before,” he says as he grins and waves a little at the audience, who chuckle.

“Of course, of course,” Jimmy says easily. “But I bet you didn’t have Starkphones then.”

Bucky shrugs. “You got me there. HYDRA didn’t care for Tony so much. I was stuck with iPhones.”

“And how was that?”

“It sucked. HYDRA’s got a bit of a hard-on for their tech- kinda like Tony-”

“Hey!” Tony protested without missing a beat.

“Doll, have you _seen_ the way you look at the armor?”

Tony gapes at him. “Lies and slander,” he finally gasps.

Steve glances amusedly at them. “You keep telling yourself that, Shellhead,” he comments.

“Traitors,” Tony mutters. “I’m surrounded by traitors.”

“Now, wait!” Jimmy cries. “Everyone knows Tony’s got a thing for tech. That’s old news. We want to hear about the iPhone.”

“Right,” Bucky nods, relaxing into the conversation. “So HYDRA insisted I use the metal arm for everything- including the phone. But you’ve seen this thing, yeah?” He wiggles the fingers of his left hand. “Does it look like it can handle touchscreens?”

Beside him, Tony straightens and looks curiously at the arm, something that both Bucky and Jimmy notice. “Bet Tony could fix it for you,” Jimmy says.

Bucky gives Tony a look akin to horror. “I’m not letting him anywhere near this arm. He’ll make it shoot bubbles or give it a vibrating function or something.”

“Are you saying you _wouldn’t_ want a vibrating function?” Tony challenges.

“Who would I use it on?” Bucky retorts. “Stevie tops.”

It takes everyone a moment to realize what he just said. Hell, it takes _Bucky_ a moment to realize what he just said. It’s not until Tony’s jaw drops open that he thinks back over his words and realizes that he just told the entire world that he’s going steady with Steve Rogers- or, at the very least, he’s being fucked by him.

Beside him, Steve stills and Bucky wonders if he’s maybe said the wrong thing. It’s not like he’d discussed it with him beforehand; he hadn’t exactly been planning on revealing their relationship on live TV. But then, Steve’s hand drops to his knee and squeezes gently. Bucky relaxes.

It’s clear that Jimmy doesn’t quite know how to handle this situation but he starts to stammer out, “Are- are you-”

“We’re soulmates,” Steve says quietly, taking pity on him. “We’ve known since we were kids.”

The studio’s completely silent for a moment and then it breaks into an uproar. There’s people shouting and laughing and crying. Jimmy tries to shout over the noise, maybe trying to calm everyone down, but he’s completely unsuccessful. Beside him, Tony looks down at the floor. He’s got some sort of look on his face, one that Bucky recognizes from the press conferences he’s watched. He can’t tell what he’s thinking but he knows that he doesn’t like seeing it on Tony’s face.

The noise level starts to die down but then Steve softly says, “Hey,” and kisses him when Bucky looks at him. The crowd breaks into shouts again. Jimmy completely gives up on trying to control it. He signals for a commercial break.

“We gotta get ahead of this,” Tony mutters and bolts out of his seat, already tapping on his phone as he disappears backstage.

“Sorry,” Bucky says, not certain if Tony can hear him.

“What are you sorry for?” Jimmy says happily as he drops into the seat Tony vacated. “I just got to break the story of the century. Ratings are gonna skyrocket. It’s a shame you don’t still have your mark.”

Steve only seems to be half paying attention to the conversation as he keeps glancing to see where Tony went, which might explain why he absently says, “Buck’s still got it.”

Jimmy’s eyes widen. “Seriously?” he asks. “Can I see?”

Bucky wraps his hand protectively around his wrist.

“Got it,” Jimmy says easily. “I don’t blame you. Mine’s been covered since I got into this business. You know David Letterman? Of course you don’t know Letterman, what am I thinking? Anyway, he started this show. He didn’t keep his covered and this fan showed up with a fake mark claiming she was his soulmate. Huge issue for him and his wife. And you two, love story of the century? You wouldn’t someone claiming to be your third.”

“Third?” Bucky asks sharply.

“Yeah, like Brad and Angelina and Jennifer.”

Bucky has no idea who those people are.

“Third soulmates are rare enough- they’re almost always fake and everyone knows it- but that’s not going to stop anyone. Just look at you two. Who wouldn’t want to be in between you?”

Third soulmates didn’t really exist when he’d been born- or no one had ever talked about them. But the idea sounds interesting and he makes a note to look it up when they get home. He can’t quite stop himself from glancing thoughtfully at where Tony disappeared to but no one other than Steve seems to notice.

* * *

The drive home is nearly silent. Bucky’s a little shaken up by the enthusiastic response from the audience. Steve’s got his arm wrapped around his shoulders, silently comforting him. Tony sits across from them. His tablet is perched on his lap. The only noise in the car comes from Tony tapping on it as he furiously communicates with the PR team. Bucky doesn’t mention that his eyes are just the slightest bit red.

They ride up in the elevator together though Tony steps off on one of the common floors. “No rest for the wicked,” he quips.

“Sorry,” Bucky tells him.

“None of that. They had to find out at some point,” Tony says distractedly, his phone already raised to his ear.

The doors close behind him.

Steve turns on him, pressing him against the wall of the elevator. “You did so good,” he growls, sucking a bruise beneath Bucky’s left ear.

They haven’t done this yet, not in the months since he left HYDRA. He knows that Steve was trying to take it slow, respect that Bucky had been trying to figure out who he was, but as Steve mouths at his neck with such exquisite pressure, he wishes that they’d moved faster. He moans, hands coming up to clutch at Steve’s back. Steve has always known exactly how to touch him, a fact that hadn’t changed in the seventy years they spent apart. He rolls his hips against Steve’s.

Steve groans lowly. “Let me make you feel good,” he whispers. He pulls away from Bucky’s neck and kisses him hard, mouth open and slick and wanting. Bucky kisses him back, licking into Steve’s mouth, wanting to make him as desperate as he is. He can feel Steve smile against his mouth. It breaks their kiss but Bucky can’t find it in himself to care when Steve returns to the spot on his neck. He throws his head back against the wall, groping his hand along it to find the emergency stop.

Steve’s hands slide up under his shirt and pull him hard against him. They rock against each other in a rhythm they’ve known for years. It’s familiar and grounding and so, _so_ good. Bucky doesn’t really want to come in the elevator but he’s pretty sure he’s going to.

He whines as one of Steve’s hands move down to rub against the bulge in his pants. His own hand moves to grasp weakly at Steve’s wrist, keeping it from going away. “I’ve got ya,” Steve pants. “I’m not gonna let you go.”

The “not this time” is unspoken but Bucky finds himself appreciating it nonetheless.

“Please,” he says. “ _Steve_.”

“Whaddya want?” Steve asks. “You gotta tell me, baby.”

His hips jerk at the words. He- he doesn’t know what he wants. He just knows that he wants _more_.

“Please,” he repeats.

Steve pulls away, not much but enough that Bucky sobs. He seems to immediately know what’s running through his head and presses a gentle kiss against his lips. “I’ve got ya,” he says again. “It’s okay.”

Then he sinks to his knees and mouths at his cock through the fabric. Bucky gapes at him. “Yeah?” Steve asks. It’s all Bucky can do to nod soundlessly. Steve rewards him with an absolutely filthy grin.

“You’ll like this,” he mutters. “Never got to show you this one. Learned it just for you.” He leans in and- and opens Bucky’s pants with his mouth. It’s the hottest thing Bucky’s ever seen. He nearly comes right then and there but Steve gets a hand on his cock, squeezing the base hard enough that it holds his orgasm back. With his other hand, he shoves Bucky’s pants down to his ankles. Bucky has a vague thought to step out of them but Steve breathes gently on his cock and all rational thought flees.

At first, he squeezes his eyes shut, unable to look at Steve, but then Steve licks lightly as his slit. His eyes fly back open and he tangles his hands in Steve’s hair. “That’s it, Buck,” Steve murmurs. He traces his tongue along the vein on the underside of Bucky’s cock before he fits his mouth over the head and sucks.

Bucky can’t stop himself from thrusting forward. He cries out, worried that he might have choked Steve, but Steve just relaxes his throat and moves down until his nose is buried in the hair at the base of his cock. He pulls back off, kisses down the side of it, sucks first one of Bucky’s balls into his mouth and then the other. There’s a wet, slick sound and Bucky looks down to see Steve’s hand buried in his own pants, pulling at his cock.

He moans, loudly, and Steve glances up at him and winks. He licks his way up Bucky’s cock and takes him back in his mouth, sucking hard. Bucky gasps out praise, babbles words he doesn’t know the meaning of. Steve takes him down into his throat, holds there, and swallows around him- once, twice.

Bucky comes hard, spilling down Steve’s throat. Steve swallows it all, hand working furiously on his cock. He groans as he comes and Bucky shudders at the feeling of the vibrations on his oversensitive cock.

Steve pulls off and presses a soft kiss to the tip. “Good boy,” he murmurs, voice wrecked. Bucky shivers again.

* * *

The team spends the next several days hiding out from the crowd camped below the tower. No one goes any lower than the common areas. Tony doesn’t even try to head down to the workshop, citing that, as secure as it is, it’s still less secure than the Avengers floors. Helicopters circle the tower constantly. Bucky knows that they’re just trying to get a picture despite the reflective glass on the windows but it still puts him on edge. The paparazzi would be the perfect cover for an assassin.

Tony keeps at least one of the screens dedicated to a running feed of what the world thinks about Bucky Barnes. “I know maybe you weren’t ready,” he comments as yet another teenage girl on Twitter declares that she’s known all along that Steve and Bucky were soulmates, “but this was perfect timing. No one’s going to say that Captain America’s soulmate is a war criminal.”

 “Tony, you might have some damage control to do,” Natasha calls, scrolling through her phone. “This person thinks you don’t look happy enough about the announcement.”

“What?” Tony asks and walks over to join her. “Show me.”

“Yeah well this one thinks you guys are having hot threesome sex,” Clint says, “’cause Bucky called you ‘doll.’”

He’d forgotten he had done that. “Didn’t mean nothing by it,” he mutters sullenly, glaring balefully at the screen. Out of the corner of his eye, he thinks he sees Tony wince but when he turns to look at him, Tony’s collapsed into Natasha’s chair. They’re squished together, his legs thrown over hers and her head resting on his shoulder. They look gorgeous together, the picture of the perfect couple.

A completely irrational and unexpected surge of jealousy rises in him. He doesn’t like that- doesn’t like it at all.

* * *

He works with the team for six months before they discover that the Winter Soldier is still very present in his mind.

The base in Uruguay is supposed to be empty. There shouldn’t be anyone there. But there is. Bucky has the fleeting thought that maybe HYDRA knew they were coming and then they’re overrun. The team is separated. He knows they’re still fighting- can hear them still over the comms though they keep cutting out- but he doesn’t know where any of them are, except for Tony who’s at his side.

HYDRA pushes him and Tony into a room. There’s no windows and only one exit, blocked now by HYDRA. They’re cornered. Tony keeps trying to aim for one of the walls, to blast it apart with the repulsors, but there’s too many people in the room and he keeps having to turn back to the fight. Bucky wishes he could help him, wishes he could take the heat off of him long enough for Tony to act, but he’s nearly overrun himself.

Tony screams.

Bucky’s blood runs cold. He whirls to see Tony slam against a wall, knocked backward by the force of a gun glowing bright blue. He’s never seen it in action but he _knows_ this gun was made from the missing scepter. Tony slides down the wall, distressingly limp. HYDRA’s men leap atop him. Bucky tries to get to him but he can’t push through the fight, can’t stop them from finding the armor’s releases and tearing it off of Tony.

They’re going to die here.

The thought no sooner arises in his mind before he feels something else- a presence blinking itself awake. He realizes what it is just as the Asset awakens fully and takes control.

* * *

The Asset doesn’t know where he is.

There’s the niggling feeling that he should know- it does look familiar- but he can’t place it. But the Asset knows he isn’t supposed to ask questions so he accepts that he doesn’t know where he is or how he got there and moves past it.

There are men facing him, fighting him, in the familiar uniforms of his handlers. Maybe he broke free of his programming. He discards the thought. These men aren’t fearful the way they would be if he escaped. These men are treating him like he’s an enemy. Is he? But even as he has the thought, the men are backing away from him, straightening.

“Солдат,” one of them says, arresting his attention. He points to an unconscious man slumped against a wall on the far side of the room. “Kill him.”

The Asset looks at the man. He takes one step toward him, then another. But there’s something inside him screaming that this is wrong. He glances back at his handlers. He’s never sought verification on an order before but he feels like he needs it this time.

“Kill him!” his handler shouts.

Uncertainly, the Asset turns back to the unconscious man. He’s surrounded by pieces of red and gold armor of a metal that he can’t identify. He moves closer, looks at the dark hair and long eyelashes, and subtracts the years from his face.

He _knows_ him.

Unbidden, his eyes jerk toward the man’s wrist. The fabric covering it is torn, showing glimpses of the bare skin beneath. It’s not right. He knows there should be a firebird there but there isn’t. But it’s still him. He knows it is. He’s found the man from his dreams- and his handlers want him to kill him.

“Мой,” he snarls and rounds on his handlers.

He cuts through them like they’re nothing more than paper. They’re not expecting him to turn on them- or to be so vicious- so they put up little more than a token resistance. He fires, reloads, and fires again. They try to draw him out but he growls lowly and refuses to take more than a few steps away from the fallen man.

One of them fires an odd-looking gun at him, glowing bright blue. He brings his metal arm up to block the shot. He’s thrown backward into the wall, agonizing pain shooting up through the arm into his shoulder. The Asset’s been trained to ignore pain but even this is near impossible to move past. He spares a second to assess the damage and stops dead at the sight of the arm. Some of the panels are bent back, twisted into something ruinous. Some are missing altogether, exposing fraying wires.

Something heavy and metal flashes by him, cutting through a handler’s arm and rebounding off the wall. The Asset shoves his pain aside and instinctively reaches out to catch it and throws it back toward a man in a spangled uniform by way of another handler.

“I’ve got eyes on Iron Man and the Winter Soldier,” a woman’s voice says. “Thor, we need a medical evac and Bruce-bring a sedative.”

The Asset rounds on the last man, crushing his windpipe with his flesh hand. He turns to look for the man and finds a red-headed woman kneeling beside him. “Мой!” he snaps harshly. “Отойди от него.”

The woman looks up at him sharply but she doesn’t move aside. He repeats himself, raising his gun to her. She doesn’t look afraid and she still doesn’t move.

“Buck,” the man in the spangled uniform says.

He doesn’t know what a Buck is and he refuses to look away from the woman standing between him and the man from his dreams. But he hears someone come up behind him. He starts to move but something sharp jabs into his neck.

The world goes black.

* * *

Bucky awakens to a bright white ceiling and metal cuffs holding him down.

He recognizes the ceiling immediately- the tower’s medical center. He’s never been in here himself but Clint had fallen off a (small) building a few missions ago, spent a few days stuck in one of the medical beds, and insisted on company in the form of Natasha and Bucky.

He tries to remember what happened. He knows there was a battle, knows they were overrun. Tony had been thrown into a wall; then there’s nothing. But he knows that something must have happened in the moments that he lost because pain is radiating through the metal arm and when he looks at it, he realizes that it’s badly mangled.

“He’s awake,” Sam says from the seat on his left. Steve appears in the doorway.

“Do you know who you are?” Steve asks. That and the cuffs tell him exactly what happened and he knows what Steve is really asking- is he the Winter Soldier?

“You have a phoenix on your wrist. It was a robin until you got the serum. You used to keep newspapers in your shoes.” He can keep going but Steve smiles softly.

“Can’t read that in a history book,” he comments.

Sam glares at both of them. “Just like that, we’re supposed to be cool?”

Bucky doesn’t blame him. If he’d just found out that an infamous assassin was still a part of his teammate, he’d be worried too. “Did I hurt anyone?” he asks hoarsely.

“Just HYDRA,” Steve says even as Sam says at the same time, “You threatened Natasha.”

“We don’t know that for certain,” Steve immediately protests.

Bucky looks between the two of them. Steve bites his lip. “You said something in Russian to her. Spooked her but she won’t tell us what it was.”

“Are you kicking me off the team?”

“Tony flew in a specialist,” Steve says, avoiding the question. “She’s meeting with him, Natasha, and Bruce now.”

 He wants to push, wants to ask what they’ll decide, if they think he should leave the tower. But Tony had been hurt and he wants to know about that more. Steve easily reads the expression on his face. “Tony’s two doors down. He had a concussion but he’s gonna be fine. Clint’s been with him, says he keeps complaining about the hospital food.”

He slumps back against the pillows, relieved.

“Oh good, you’re awake,” a new voice says. Steve steps aside to allow an older woman into the room, followed by Natasha. The woman isn’t wearing scrubs or a lab coat of any sort so Bucky figures she must be the specialist.

“Hi, I’m Dr. Elizabeth Howell; I study dissociative identity disorder,” she says, reaching out to shake his hand before she realizes he’s cuffed to the bed. She glances briefly at Natasha, who reaches into her pocket. A second later, there’s a soft click and the cuffs detach from his wrists. He sits up and takes the offered hand.

“Bucky,” he says in return. “Dissociative identity…?”

“Disorder,” she finishes. “Multiple personalities. I believe we were still calling it hysterical neurosis in the 1940s.”

Bucky just shrugs. It might have been called that but he would never have had the money to go see a doc and wouldn’t have wanted to anyway.

“Is that what I’ve got?” he asks. “Multiple personalities?”

“It’s possible,” Dr. Howell replies, inclining her head. “They do tend to stem from trauma and they’re often marked with periods of amnesia. But it would certainly be the longest case I’ve heard of between personality switches.”

“I wasn’t awake for all of it,” Bucky says.

She smiles kindly, sympathetically. “I know,” she says. “Mr. Stark said you sometimes have nightmares where you remember your time as a POW?”

He nods.

She frowns just a little but it’s more thoughtful than disappointed. “That’s unusual as well and it’s very odd that he reacted violently towards those soldiers but not your teammates. If he were truly another personality, it seems more likely that he would have either seen the soldiers as friends and your teammates as enemies or seen everyone as an enemy. It could be that the Winter Soldier was simply a defense mechanism you developed, nothing more than a projection of your brain to protect itself from what was being done to you.”

“I thought I threatened Natasha,” Bucky protests.

Natasha shakes her head. “Not like how you’re thinking. You thought I was going to hurt Tony but you didn’t attack me. You just ordered me to move.”

“We can pursue a diagnosis- and possible treatment- if you like,” Dr. Howell continues. “But plenty of people are able to live perfectly normal lives ignorant of their alternate personalities.”

Bucky stares at Natasha. “And if I don’t like?” he asks.

She crosses her arms and leans against the doorjamb. “We’re taking you off the rotation for public missions, short of a world-ending emergency, until we know if the Winter Soldier is violent toward everyone, when he’ll come out, if he’s controllable. You can still join us to take down HYDRA bases, if you want, but we can’t risk anything more public. Our first priority-”

“-are the people we’re protecting,” Bucky finishes. It’s a common enough phrase, recited around the conference table. He’s heard it in reference to Tony trying to suit up to fight sea monsters after his flashback and Steve trying to take on a mission in the Arctic but it hasn’t been applied to him yet.

“I’m sorry, Bucky,” Natasha says sympathetically.

“’m not upset,” he mumbles and he’s _not_. Not really and certainly not with the Avengers. He understands that he’s a liability right now and that the team has to look out for everyone else. But he _is_ angry at HYDRA for taking something else from him.

He hears Dr. Howell saying something about leaving some books for him and offering her office if he wants anyone to talk to. He nods numbly and she leaves.

* * *

He’s not entirely certain when Steve and Sam leave but he does know that when he finally realizes it’s long past midnight, they’re both gone. He takes a moment to figure out that no one’s strapped him back in to the cuffs and swings his legs over the side of the bed, pausing long enough to take out his IV before standing. He’s sure that he’s not supposed to leave, sure that he probably has to stay in medical for at least another day but he can’t be here. He can’t focus, he can’t _breathe_ -

“James?”

He stops at the sound of that soft, sleepy voice. Tony’s standing in the doorway, wearing just a loose pair of sweatpants that’s all but hanging off of his hips and a tank top, looking so tired but still determined. He’s got a small toolkit in his hand.

“Tony,” he says, surprised. “Doll, what are you doing here?”

“I was worried about your arm,” Tony replies, taking a hesitant step further into the room. “I didn’t want it to hurt.”

His heart warms. “It could have waited until morning.”

Tony moves closer, looking up at him with these big, luminous eyes. “But it hurts,” he repeats. “I know it does. I can help.”

Bucky glances down at the arm with its twisted or missing panels. “I don’t think even you can fix this,” he says doubtfully.

“No,” Tony says softly. “It’ll have to be replaced. But it must have pain receptors.”

He doesn’t honestly know. He doesn’t share many of the Asset’s memories and what he does share centers more around what he did for HYDRA, not what HYDRA did to him.

Tony’s right in front of him now and he whispers, “Please, James,” and Bucky finds that he’s helpless to refuse. He lets Tony sit down in the chair next to the bed, rests the arm on the bed, and watches as he pulls out a small jeweler’s screwdriver.

He’s watched Tony in his workshop before, knows that he’s got steady, gentle hands. He’s seen Tony work on the bots and knows that Tony would sooner hurt himself than him. But that doesn’t stop the Winter Soldier from raising his head in the back of his mind.

“Stop,” he says quickly, just as Tony reaches for his arm. Tony immediately pulls back. “I can feel him. I don’t- I don’t want him to hurt you.”

Tony frowns. “Is this too similar to what HYDRA did?”

Bucky hears a flash of remembered screams, feels the agonizing pain that his handlers had put him through every time the arm had needed maintenance. The Asset, in the back of his mind, feels tense, poised to take over if it hurts again. He nods.

“Is it the position or the maintenance itself? Because I don’t feel comfortable knocking you out. Not when I need to know what hurts and what doesn’t.”

Bucky doesn’t really know the answer to that question and it seems that the Asset doesn’t know either. The Asset just knows that he doesn’t want Bucky to go through that pain again. He hadn’t existed when the arm had been amputated. He hadn’t been able to stop that pain but he can stop the rest of it. Bucky tells all of that to Tony.

“Winter’s protecting you,” Tony says slowly. “He woke up because he thought you were going to die.”

He doesn’t think that’s quite right- it’s mostly right but not fully but he doesn’t know what else they could be missing.

“And we don’t know what’s going to set him off,” Tony muses. “Nothing else to do for it. Has to be done.”

In one fluid motion, he stands and moves to sit in Bucky’s lap, straddling him. Automatically, Bucky’s hands rise to his waist to steady him. He feels like he should be pushing Tony off but the feeling of the Asset fades away into the depths of his thoughts and, well, Tony feels _good_ \- natural, almost- in his lap.

“What are you doing, doll?” he grits out through a clenched jaw.

“Bet HYDRA’s never done this,” Tony says simply though his mild tone is belied by his wide eyes. “Drop your arm please. It’s hard to work on it when you’re holding onto me.”

After a moment, Bucky lets go of his waist with the metal arm and drops it back to the bed. Tony leans back a little. Bucky’s flesh hand slides to wrap fully around his back. “This is okay, right?” Tony asks. “I know I should have asked but I didn’t want to warn Winter.”

It’s not okay. It should feel wrong and awful but it doesn’t. Tony’s warm and perfect in his lap and Stevie had _never_ done this, even when he was littler, and Bucky’s never known what he was missing out on and this shouldn’t feel _good_ but it does.

“It’s fine,” he says.

Tony nods once and gets to work, seemingly not minding that he’s perched on Bucky or that Bucky’s arm is still wrapped around his waist. He chatters ceaselessly to him, asking him if he remembers where the pain receptors are and telling him exactly what he’s doing. It’s nothing like what HYDRA did and he feels the Asset settle just a little bit further. Eventually, he locates the receptors and swears as he looks at the mess that makes up the receptors.

“This’ll probably hurt,” he warns. “Tell Winter I’ll try and make it as quick as possible.”

Bucky doesn’t know how he’s supposed to do that but he feels a little bit warmer that Tony’s doing his best to make a very difficult situation easier. He tightens his grip on Tony’s waist, worried that he might try to buck him off.

“Let’s do it,” he says.

It _does_ hurt but the Asset doesn’t come out, seemingly taking Tony at his word that he’s not doing it on purpose. Tony does work fast, his hands all but a blur as he dismantles the wires sending pain shooting into his brain. He doesn’t think it hurts for longer than a minute before all sensation in the arm abruptly shuts off. It’s so surprising that his arm damn near flies off the bed and smacks him in the face.

“Better?” Tony asks worriedly.

Bucky can’t remember the last time he was pain free. He stares in disbelief at the arm. “Better?” he repeats. “Tony, this is perfect.”

Tony ducks his head shyly, smiling. “Not perfect, not until we can get a new arm installed.” He studies the arm. “I bet I could get some of those panels back into place. Want me to try?”

It doesn’t hurt anymore so Bucky lets him. Tony babbles about his plans for the new arm and how it’ll be lighter and won’t hurt the way the old one does and “are you sure you don’t want a vibrator?” The clock’s ticked an hour closer to morning before Tony’s words start to falter and then stop altogether.

Bucky, near lulled to sleep himself, startles awake when Tony stops talking. “Doll?” he asks, just as Tony’s head slumps into the crook of his neck.

Oh.

He gets an arm under Tony’s thighs and lifts him up long enough to rearrange them at the head of the bed, Bucky still mostly sitting up and Tony draped across his lap. He’s known since he first started sharing a bed with Tony during their nightmares that Tony’s a cuddler so this isn’t really anything new. But it sort of feels new. It feels lovely and wonderful and a thousand adjectives that he doesn’t really have words for at the moment. He’s incapable of falling asleep, not with this odd sensation running through his chest. So he sits there and lets Tony sleep and listens to him breathe.

And the thing is- Tony’s beautiful. He is. Objectively, Bucky’s known that since he met the man. But with Tony curled into him, nuzzling into his chest each time they shift, he thinks that Tony might be the prettiest thing he’s seen since the first time he met Steve.

Tony’s kind. He houses a team of unstable superheroes and forgives people for the murder of his parents and has never once said a cruel word to Bucky even though he had all but stolen Steve away from him.

Tony’s smart, god he’s so smart. He builds robots and AIs and flying cars that are nothing more than a gimmick. He’s already working on a brand-new arm for Bucky and Bucky knows that his arm is already an engineering marvel but Tony’s got ways to make it _better_.

He’s loyal and he’s compassionate and he’s so, _so_ sweet and he refuses to see the good in himself even while he insists on the best in everyone else.

The sun’s starting to shine through the gap in the curtains when Bucky realizes there are eyes on them. He looks toward the doorway to see Steve watching them with this half-fond, half-melancholic expression on his face and he gets it. He does because the thing is-

“Stevie,” he realizes. “I think I’m in love with him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some fun things I learned doing research for this chapter:  
> There is actually a lab at the University of Florida studying the types of radicals formed from secondary organic aerosols.  
> The numbers matching game Bucky's playing on his phone while waiting for Nat is 2048.  
> Dr. Elizabeth Howell does study dissociative identity disorder and has a very nice office in New York.
> 
> I don't speak Russian and I don't know anyone who speaks Russian so I did the best I could with the translations. So in order:  
> Солдат- Soldier  
> Мой- Mine  
> Отойди от него- Get away from him.


	5. Go and Claim Your Kingdom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Steve thinks about asking Tony out, realizes that Tony's got a soulmate, tells Bucky about their third soulmate, and starts looking for their third

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do want to warn you all about something but it's a bit spoilery so, if you're curious, check the endnotes.

“Really,” Sam states- or, well, puffs since they’re out running. “You think you’re in love with Tony.”

Steve- who isn’t breathing hard at all- eyes him. “You don’t sound surprised.”

“Why would I be surprised?” Sam says with a huffed-out laugh. “I haven’t even been here that long and it’s obvious. Bucky falling for him- that’s a little bit more surprising but I still think we all saw that one coming.”

Well, it was surprising to Steve. Sam clearly sees that on his face and continues, “Come on, man. They share a bed when they have nightmares and you think he _wasn’t_ going to fall for him?”

That’s also news to Steve. He knows that Bucky’s been leaving in the middle of the night every time he can’t sleep but he just thought he’d been going out to the couch to watch TV or something, not that he’d been finding his way to Tony’s bed. He thinks, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he should probably be jealous but he isn’t. He’s known since the beginning that Nat and occasionally Clint sleep with Tony. If he hadn’t been such a fucking coward who’d been afraid of letting his feelings be plain, he probably would have asked to sleep with him too. He can’t blame Bucky for having the courage he hadn’t had.

All he says is, “Good for him.”

“Where is Bucky anyway?” Sam lengthens his stride to avoid a rock in the middle of the sidewalk.

“Trying to convince Tony that we absolutely do not need to be invited to Christmas with the Rhodes,” Steve says. He slows to a walk. They’ve already run ten miles and the tower’s only another few blocks away. They can walk the rest of the distance. Besides, there’s a new donut shop that opened up somewhere around here and he wants to try it.

“I’d invite you to my family’s too if I thought you’d take me up on it.” Steve shoots him a glare and Sam holds up his hands as he too slow down. “Look, none of us get why you’d want to spend Christmas alone.”

“I’m not spending it alone. I’ve got Bucky.”

“Yeah but you could also have Clint’s family or you could have mine or you could have the apparent love of your life’s.”

“We don’t want to spend it with anyone else’s family.”

“Not even Tony’s?” Sam asks skeptically.

“Colonel Rhodes called to tell me that I was absolutely not welcome at his home until I’d made up for last year.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. You heard about that too?”

“Asked why you and Nat were in D.C. She answered.”

They fall silent for a bit as they walk, Steve’s head practically on a swivel as he looks for the donut place. He spots the bakery and motions toward it. Sam follows cheerfully with nothing more than a “You’ll have to get enough for everyone.” Donuts are as popular a treat in the tower as Tony’s smoothies or Nat’s cupcakes.

The place is pretty packed, considering it’s only been open for thirty minutes and it’s five in the morning in the middle of December. They join the queue. Sam pulls out his phone, texting someone (probably Bucky).

“How are your sessions?” Steve asks after another minute. He doesn’t like to bring his phone on his runs (something that upsets Tony to no end) so it’s not like he has anything else to entertain himself with. He knows Sam won’t give him specifics about the people he works with but he likes hearing about what little bit Sam _can_ tell him.

Sam finishes up his text and then puts his phone back in his pocket. “They’re nice,” he says. “I like having people I can talk to. Don’t get me wrong- you and Bucky are great but your war experience was very different than mine.”

“You could talk to Rhodes,” Steve offers.

Sam raises an eyebrow and grins. “Hoping I’ll put in a good word for you?” Steve splutters because that _hadn’t_ been on his mind but Sam’s grin just grows wider. “Nah, I know you weren’t. And I do talk to him. But he’s not in New York a lot and, sometimes a face-to-face conversation can mean more than a text.” He glances up at the menu as the line crawls forward a few feet. “Think they’ve got regular donuts or just this specialty stuff?”

“I like the specialty stuff,” Steve muses. “One of those nice things about the future.”

Sam pulls his phone back out. “Nat’s gonna want the peanut butter cup one,” he mutters and starts making a list on his phone. “And Thor’s gonna want the Poptart flavor.”

“Get him the lemon poppyseed too. He mentioned going to see Jane today.”

“Gross,” Sam complains.

“Lemons or poppyseeds?”

“Both are nasty.”

Steve looked at him amusedly but continues, “Tony’ll want the Boston crème and Buck’ll like the coffee cake.”

“Clint and Bruce?”

“For Bruce, the samoa and get Clint the maple bacon.”

“Gross,” Sam says again, more emphatically this time. “An espresso buttercream for me and you’ll want the cinnamon sugar because, no matter what you say, you’re boring.”

“Hey!” Steve protests mildly.

“You refuting it?”

“…get something other than the espresso buttercream or Tony’s gonna steal it.”

“That boy and coffee.” Sam shakes his head. They move forward again. He repeats the order to the girl at the counter, pretending not to notice the way the bakers are whispering to each other, and then shows her the phone when she can’t quite remember it all.

“How much?” Steve asks, beginning to rifle through his wallet.

“On the house,” the girl says shyly. “If we can get a picture for our wall.” She gestures behind them to the wall, which is indeed covered in pictures of the celebrities that have visited in the month since the bakery opened.

“You the owner?” When she nods, he offers, “How about you let me pay and we’ll _still_ take a picture for your wall? We’re ordering a lot of food. You’ll make me feel bad if you don’t let me pay.”

“And you don’t want Captain America to feel bad,” Sam adds with a grin. “That’s against the Constitution or something.”

“It’s the Declaration of Independence and you know it,” Steve says without missing a beat. He’s used to this sort of teasing from the others. Tony, in particular, likes to make fun of the whole Captain America spiel.

The girl looks thrilled to have Captain America and the Falcon in her store and she takes the picture with trembling hands. Then, as Sam waits by the counter, she shakes Steve’s hand. “I was in the subway station,” she confesses, “when the aliens attacked. You saved my life.”

Steve only vaguely remembers taking down a group of the Chitauri in some sort of subway station and then getting blasted through a window. But he smiles warmly like he remembers it perfectly and says, “I’m just glad I could help.”

Sam taps his shoulder and holds up the purple and white box. “Time to go.”

“Sorry, ma’am,” Steve says politely. “It was nice talking to you.”

“Does it ever get old?” Sam asks as the door closes behind them. “Being recognized everywhere you go.”

“Sometimes,” Steve admits. “Getting stopped twenty times in a day can get pretty tiring. But it’s not like that to them- they think they’re the first ones to recognize me all day and most of them have some sort of personal story. I like to do what I can.”

Sam shakes his head admiringly. “And you still paid for the donuts. You know Clint tries to use his Avengers discount everywhere he goes?”

Steve groans. “Don’t remind me.”

“Okay,” Sam says easily- too easily. “Then how ‘bout you tell me what you and Bucky plan to do about Tony?”

Steve groans louder. “We haven’t talked about it much. Buck’s only known for a few weeks.”

“So you aren’t planning on asking him out,” Sam states. It’s definitely not a question, more like a conclusion that he thinks they should have already come to. “Because that would be a terrible idea.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re soulmates and he’s not? There’s a lotta people out there who wouldn’t mind being a third wheel to you two and Tony Stark is _not_ one of them.”

Steve can see his point. Tony has shockingly low self-esteem and he and Bucky… well, there are a lot of sensationalists calling their story the romance of the century. “But he doesn’t have one.”

“Yeah, that’s what they say,” Sam says. Steve must look confused because Sam laughs at the look on his face and continues, “Look, you didn’t grow up with Tony Stark. Tony was bigger than life back then- he still is but there was something _more_ about it then. You either wanted to be him or fuck him and there was this whole appeal about being his soulmate, like it was a Cinderella story or something. But it was pretty obvious that Tony hated being asked about his mark. It was one of those do-not-ask questions in interviews, not that it stopped the paparazzi. He used to wear a band, did you know that? Then there was this day that I guess too many reporters asked about it and the next time anyone sees him, he’s got a bare wrist and that was the end of the questions.”

“So his soulmate’s dead,” Steve concludes, which is exactly the conclusion he’d had when he first met Tony.

Sam grimaces. “Maybe, maybe not. Right after SI stopped making weapons, they released this special new tech for people- celebrities, really- who wanted to hide their mark. It blends in with your skin. There’s a bunch of celebrities who’ve got one now.”

“You think Tony wears one?”

Sam shrugs. “Being Tony Stark’s soulmate comes with a bunch of benefits. How could he know that his soulmate isn’t just after those benefits?”

* * *

Christmas is a quiet affair. Tony’s at the Rhodes’, Clint and Nat went back to Clint’s, Sam’s back home in D.C. with his family, Thor went home to Asgard with Jane, and Bruce goes to Virginia to visit some sort of professor (“His soulmate,” Tony says. “They can’t be together- her dad’s made sure of that but he tries to see her when he can.”).

It’s just Steve and Bucky in the tower, not that they mind. They’d spent a lot of Christmases just the two of them after they’d gotten their own apartment, despite both of Bucky’s parents inviting them over (and Bucky’s sister telling them that they have to come over because she has no one’s tea to put pepper in with them away). They laze around in pajamas and watch shitty Hallmark movies on the TV and eat way too many sugar cookies. It’s nearing midnight before they finally get around to opening the gifts the team had left them before heading their separate ways.

Thor’s present is a jug of Asgardian mead. The card tells them that if anything can get them drunk, it’ll be this. Steve and Bucky take one whiff and promptly decide to make sure they try it before the rest of the team comes home.

Bruce gets them both books- one on the modernist art movement for Steve and one on car mechanics for Bucky. He also gets them signed copies of _The Hobbit_ and _The Lord of the Rings_ , apparently obtained when his father- a literature professor- had visited Oxford in the 1960s. Steve cries; Bucky surreptitiously removes the books from Steve’s lap.

Nat gets them very expensive running shoes with a note that tells them that they better stop using their regular walking shoes on their morning runs because she’s tired of going shoe shopping with them after they wear them out.

Sam gets them a series of gift cards to various date activities. His card says, “If you’re going to try to woo Tony, then you better do it right. Jim said that Tony likes these kinds of places.”

Rhodes’ present is a piece of paper that warns them that he’s watching them.

Clint gives them the world’s tackiest ties. Steve’s has bacon on it. Bucky’s has sequins and lights up. Clint’s card says that they have to wear them to the next gala Tony invites them to because he wants to see Tony faint.

They like Tony’s present the best, though that’s not surprising. Tony’s present is a joint one like Thor’s. It’s a painting that Steve had done of Bucky the first year they’d moved into their apartment. Bucky’s in profile and looking out the window of their apartment. His arm is propped up on the windowsill, proudly displaying the robin in flight. It had hung in their bedroom until the day Steve had crashed the plane. It’s Steve’s favorite portrait that he’d ever done of Bucky but Howard apparently hadn’t kept it like he’d kept the rest of Steve’s things (“Howard didn’t much care for the idea of soulmates,” Tony says quietly). He had thought it lost. He has no idea where Tony found it and Tony’s card doesn’t say anything other than “Merry Christmas!”

Steve cries again. Bucky removes the painting from Steve’s lap.

* * *

He wakes up on the morning after Tony gets back to find himself alone in bed. His first immediate thought is that Bucky’s sharing Tony’s bed after several nights of nightmares in a row. But when he asks JARVIS, he’s told that they’re both down in the lab instead. He heads downstairs and finds Tony showing Bucky a mockup of the new arm he’d spent the last several weeks designing.

“-sure you don’t want me to add the vibrator function?” Tony’s asking teasingly as the door opens.

Bucky hesitates. “Go ahead,” he says.

Clearly, Tony wasn’t expecting that answer and he blinks. He shoots a nervous glance at Steve. “You- really?”

“Unless you don’t want to,” Bucky says.

Tony clutches the mockup to him (and it’ll always amaze Steve how Tony manages to interact with his holograms). “No! You said I could! No takebacks!” He glances again at Steve. “Just- you said Steve-” To Steve’s immense surprise, he blushes, seemingly incapable of finishing the sentence.

“Tops?” Bucky says lazily. Tony lets out a tiny squeak, barely audible even to Steve’s enhanced hearing. “Yeah, he does. But you never know. He might surprise me one of these days.”

He won’t. He doesn’t like the uncomfortable feeling of being full. But he thinks Tony might. Tony’s got a couple videos out there that Steve’s watched once or twice (or more until Nat tells him that they were leaked, not consensual) and there’s a bit of a running theme in all those videos and- yeah, he thinks Tony would like the vibrator.

* * *

Sometimes, he thinks that he and Tony might have been hurtling toward something before everything had gone so wrong with the team. He remembers how Tony had looked at him and how he’d stuck by Steve’s side at the few galas they’d attended and how game nights had been _their_ nights. He remembers the devastated look on Tony’s face when he’d found out that Steve’s soulmate had been Bucky. He’s still not entirely certain why Tony had looked so crestfallen but he thinks (hopes, really) that maybe it had been because Tony had at least a few feelings for him.

Sometimes, he thinks that Tony still feels that way. He watches as Tony goes to event after event and comes home alone. He sees how Tony eyes Bucky’s arms, both real and mechanical, and Steve’s shirts with an appreciative gleam. He hears how soft Tony’s voice is when Bucky has a bad day, how he always laughs at the worst of Steve’s jokes.

Sometimes, he thinks that they’ve got a chance.

* * *

Steve’s sitting in the living room, reading a book when Clint strolls by loudly proclaiming, “Don’t mind me. I’m just gonna go hide forever,” which of course catches Steve’s attention. He puts the book down and watches as Clint casually waltzes to the elevator with only a few nervous glances. He’s just getting ready to press the button when it dings.

Clint looks up at it in awe and whispers, “Elevator fairies.”

From his viewpoint, Steve can’t see who steps out of the elevator but he does see Clint’s face brighten as he says, “Hey, Sharon! You didn’t happen to see the actual god of thunder on your way up, did you?”

A voice that Steve remembers all too well from his time in D.C. says, “No. What did you do this time?”

“Great!” Clint chirps, ignoring the question. “Goodbye forever!” The elevator chimes behind him.

Steve stands and faces the blonde woman- Sharon- looking after Clint bemusedly. “Neighbor,” he greets slowly, still trying to figure out what she’s doing in the tower.

“Captain Rogers,” she replies evenly, an amused glint in her eyes. “I’m just here to see Tony. JARVIS, can you tell him I’m here?”

There’s the sound of something breaking somewhere down the hallway. “I believe Sir already knows,” JARVIS replies dryly.

Then there’s the pitter-patter of feet running down the hall, a blur zooming by Steve, and then Tony throws himself into Sharon’s arms, yelling delightedly, “Sharon!”

“Tony!” Sharon says in the exact same tone.

“Are you here to finally join the Avengers? Are you, are you, are you, are you, are-”

“No, I’m not!” Sharon finally says with a laugh.

Tony pouts and Sharon adjusts her arms so that she’s holding Tony up with one arm and thumbs his bottom lip free with the other hand. “Aunt Peggy says that your face will get stuck like that.”

“Won’t,” Tony insists. “What are you doing here?”

“I just wanted to see my favorite cousin.”

“Lies,” Tony says cheerfully. “I saw you and Peggy at New Year’s. What are you actually doing here?”

Sharon laughs again. “Can’t pull a fast one on you, huh? I’m being transferred up here-”

“And you need a place to stay? Great, there are tons of empty floors, you can have one of them. I’d say that’s what Maria does but she said that dealing with me daily was more than enough, she doesn’t need to deal with me nightly too.”

“No, actually, but- wow, that sounds really nice. You’re sure?” Sharon asks.

“I’ll have to clear it with the rest of the team but I don’t see it being a problem.”

“Sharon…Carter?” Steve asks suddenly, the pieces clicking in his mind. Both Tony and Sharon turn to look at him.

“Yes,” Tony says and peers at him. “Didn’t you know that? Sharon, didn’t you tell him your name?”

“I was undercover. That’s like Rule Number One,” she says teasingly. “We can’t all be famous and wear “You Know Who I Am” nametags.”

“That was one time!”

“New Year’s Eve 2000,” Sharon begins dreamily. She shoots a look at Steve. “Did he tell you about this one?”

 Before Steve can say anything, Thor stomps into the room. His front is utterly covered in some sort of purple powder that he’s attempting unsuccessfully to wipe off with a towel. Sharon and Tony both hide snickers and even Steve can’t stop himself from grinning.

“Tell me, where is Clint?” Thor demands. “I would have words with him.”

“Did you check the Roadster?” Tony asks immediately. “He likes to hide there. Thinks it’s classy.”

“Thank you,” Thor says gravely and stomps by. He jabs at the button so hard there’s an audible crack. Tony winces.

Steve glances back at Sharon. “You want to move _here_?”

She shrugs lightly but there’s definitely an apprehensive look on her face as she gazes after Thor. “Can’t be any different than growing up with Morita’s kids, right?”

* * *

They’re on a mission- or rather, Tony and Nat are on a mission. Steve is sitting in the back of a van with Bucky, Clint, and Sharon (who hadn’t put up much of a fuss when she’d been assigned as the liaison to the Avengers by the CIA so Steve thinks that she maybe wants to be an Avenger more than she thinks). Technically, it’s Clint’s op but Sharon had taken over within a minute and a half and she’d since ordered the other three to be silent after Tony had nearly ripped out his earbud very publicly.

One of Clint’s informants had picked up whispers of an auction for the last of the Chitauri weapons with the rumors of something big being sold there. Clint had thought it might be the scepter, still cloaked evidently from the scans Tony and Bruce had been running night and day.

“I’d go myself,” Clint says during the debrief. “But I’m only good at certain types of undercover work and fancy parties aren’t it.”

So it had fallen to Tony and Nat to go undercover and recover the stolen weapons. Truthfully, Steve hadn’t seen how Tony would be able to go undercover as one of the most famous people in the world. But then Tony had shown up wearing a false beard and nose, both of which fit seamlessly onto his face, and colored contacts and Nat had shown up, wearing one of those masks she’d had during the fall of SHIELD. Steve had just said, “Ah,” and left it at that.

“Pulling up visuals now,” Sharon muttered. “And I’ve got eyes on you in the hallway.”

They were trying first to get to the weapons before the auction even occurred. “As a last resort,” Tony had said during the briefing, “I’ll buy them if I have to.”

“Energy signatures put the weapons four doors down the hall.”

Nat hums, the only sort of acknowledgment they can expect during these missions, and slinks down the hall. Tony follows after her, hand raised slightly. They can see the glint of the wrist gauntlet on the shitty cameras.

“I don’t like this,” Bucky says, shifting. “We should be there with him- them.”

Sharon and Clint both glance at him, brows raised. It’s such a similar look that Steve can’t help but wonder if they learned it from each other. “Working on the lock,” Nat murmurs and Sharon turns back to the screens. Clint, however, doesn’t; he just stares at Bucky for a long time before his gaze finally shifts to Steve.

“You dance well,” Tony says suddenly. This isn’t uncommon, Tony talking when he’s nervous and it’s clear Nat doesn’t mind and she flashes a quick grin at him. Steve still grits his teeth at the reminder of her in Tony’s arms. That should be him or Bucky there (probably Bucky since Steve’s got two left feet).

“The Red Room insisted on ballet lessons,” she replies, still working away at the lock. It usually doesn’t take her this long and Steve feels a twinge of worry.

Tony looks intrigued. “To help you be a better assassin?”

“That and it was an excellent cover.”

Even through the grainy video feed, Steve can see Tony’s doubtful expression. “Ballerinas can get to be pretty famous. That sounds like a poor cover to me.”

“I never said we were good enough to be famous, just enough to travel.” She frowns at the lock. “This lock is slightly smarter than me. Only slightly, mind you.”

“Move over,” Tony says. “I can take a look.”

“I didn’t know you could pick locks,” Clint comments.

“Aunt Peggy taught us many skills,” Sharon says mysteriously.

Tony snorts.

Abruptly, Bucky points at one of the screens. “Stevie, there!”

“Shit,” Sharon says. “Nat, Tony- you’ve got incoming.”

“How many?” Nat asks as Tony begins working on the lock faster.

“Five and they’ve got guns.”

“’Just bring a few knives, Natasha,’” Nat whines. “’You won’t need guns, Natasha.’ ‘They’ll ruin the line of your dress, Natasha.’”

“You’re not helping,” Tony snarls. He jimmies the lock again but there’s no reassuring click.

“You’ve got at most ten seconds,” Clint says.

“Tony,” Nat begins. Steve knows that tone of voice. He’s been on the other end of that tone of voice. His hands clench on the armrests and he hears a foreboding crunch. “Get up here and kiss me.”

Tony drops the lockpick. “ _What?_ ”

“Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable.”

He sounds nearly hysterical when he says, “Yes, they do!”

Nat grimaces and hauls him up by the arm, slams him into the wall by the door, and kisses him hard. In the back of his mind, Steve registers Bucky protesting, “Hey, she can’t do that!” but his eyes are fixed on the way Tony stiffens and then relaxes under Nat with a soft mewl.

The armrests crack in half.

* * *

Tony’s sitting in Nat’s armchair, as entangled with her as he always is. His head’s resting on Nat’s shoulder, which is why he doesn’t see the glares Steve and Bucky keep shooting her and the smug look she shoots back. They’re both wrapped up in a warm blanket, something that Sharon had insisted on after they’d returned from their mission half-frozen following their escape from the mansion after nearly getting caught by the guards. Evidently, public displays of affection work on getting _in_ to places but not necessarily getting back _out_ , particularly not with duffel bags filled with Chitauri weapons.

The team’s gathered in the common room, watching some documentary that Bruce had wanted to see about a girl sailing around the world. It’s neither very boring nor very interesting and so Steve doesn’t blame Tony or Thor for falling asleep five minutes in or Sharon, Sam, or Bucky for being on their phones. He _does_ blame Natasha for spending the movie petting Tony’s hair and silently laughing at the fuming expression on Steve’s face but that’s a personal thing. It has nothing to do with the movie.

His phone, currently sitting on the coffee table, lights up. Usually, he would ignore it because he likes to at least pretend that he’s paying attention to the films that don’t interest him (if only because it matters to his teammates) but Sharon catches his eye and points at the phone, waving her own slightly.

 _Tony is my favorite cousin and if you, or Barnes, hurt him in any way, they’ll never find your bodies because I’ll hand you over to Aunt Peggy_.

Steve winces.

Bucky leans over and whispers, “I see she got to you too.”

* * *

They’re two weeks out from Valentine’s when it all comes crashing down. Bucky wants to ask Tony out for the holiday and, despite the fact that it’s cheesy and old-fashioned and whatever else Clint wants to accuse them of, Steve agrees. They’ve got plans to take him to a nice restaurant, one of the ones that Sam had recommended, and then to a show afterwards. Nat’s managed to get them tickets for _Les Misérables_ after helping out with a shootout at one of the theaters.

It’s the final fitting for Bucky’s new arm and, if all goes well, they’re planning on asking him out afterwards.

It’s just- when the elevator doors slide open, they catch a glimpse of Tony scrubbing at something on his left wrist, something bright red, before blowing on it and laying down some sort of covering. Both Steve and Bucky freeze in horror as the covering shimmers once and then fades to match the color of Tony’s wrist. It’s painfully apparent what they’ve just seen.

Tony glances up toward the elevator, a bright smile on his face that immediately disappears when he sees their expressions. Hastily, he looks back at his wrist, as though checking that it’s fully covered.

“It’s fine,” Steve murmurs as he opens the workshop door though his gaze is still on the covering. He ushers Bucky inside. “We didn’t catch more than a glimpse.”

“Tony, _doll_ ,” Bucky begins, the agony in his voice clear only to Steve who’s known him so long, “you’ve got a mark.” He tears his eyes away from Tony’s wrist and up to his face. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

Tony hides his wrist behind his back, clearly discomfited. “Because it doesn’t matter,” he insists.

“Doesn’t matter?” Bucky replies. Steve can see the pain in Tony’s eyes and he motions for Bucky to stop but he must not see it because he continues, “You let us think they were _dead_!”

Tony stills and his voice is ice cold when he retorts, “They’re as good as.”

Steve connects the dots first. “They rejected you?” he asks quietly.

Looking away as though he can’t bear to see them, Tony nods. “I wasn’t wanted,” he says, voice filled with raw anguish.

Steve wants to tell him that that’s bullshit, that anyone should be glad- lucky even- to have Tony Stark as their soulmate. He can look at Bucky and see that Bucky wants to say the same thing. _They_ would be glad to have Tony as their soulmate. But this isn’t the time. It’s painfully obvious that Tony’s rejection still hurts, that whoever his soulmate is, he still loves them very deeply.

“Maybe this isn’t-” he begins.

“Nonsense,” Tony interrupts. He quickly wipes at his eyes, Steve pretending that he didn’t see that, and turns back to them. If his eyes are still a little bright, well, Steve doesn’t mention it and neither does Bucky. “You’re here, I’m here, the arm’s here. Might as well get it done. Come on, Buckaroo, got a nice setup here in the back for you. Is Winter going to let me sit next to you ‘cause let me tell you, your lap’s nice and all but it’ll be easier to do this from a chair.”

* * *

They don’t talk about it. They should. They know they should but they don’t. By silent agreement, they both decide that they can’t ask Tony out. It’s just that there’s something very different about asking him out when they thought his soulmate was dead and asking him out when they knew that his soulmate had rejected him. The thing is, knowing that he’s got a soulmate out there alive and well and doesn’t want him and asking him out anyway feels an awful lot like rubbing their relationship in his face, especially when it was so clear during their conversation that Tony loves his soulmate an awful lot. After all, Steve and Bucky are made for each other- had been made for each other _twice_ , had managed to _find_ each other twice.

Steve doesn’t really know how he’s managed to fuck this up this badly. He’d thought for years that he and Tony were headed towards a relationship. Even after Bucky had come back, his thought hadn’t just been that Tony would make a nice addition to his relationship with Bucky but often that _Bucky_ would make a nice addition to his relationship with _Tony_.

How could he have missed the signs? How could he have missed seeing how much Tony loves his soulmate?

They don’t ask him out for Valentine’s. They don’t even go out themselves. Steve cooks them dinner on their floor and they stay in, watching old romantic comedies from the ‘40s, laughing hysterically to cover up the fact that they feel like there’s an empty spot between them. He fucks Bucky afterward, pretending the entire time that he isn’t wishing that it’s Tony’s hips he’s holding onto. He pretends too that he doesn’t hear Bucky call Tony’s name as he comes, that he doesn’t notice Bucky’s outstretched arm looking for a small hand to grasp.

Sam’s waiting for them in their living room the next morning. “You want to tell me what’s going on?” he asks the moment they leave their bedroom.

For a brief second, Steve pretends denying that he knows what he’s talking about. Sam’s eyes narrow. “You go from looking at Tony like he hung the moon to looking like he broke your hearts. You spend Valentine’s here instead of out with your boy like you were planning so something happened and Tony just looks confused and hurt every time you leave the room instead of talking to him so I think it’s your fault.”

“He’s got a soulmate,” Bucky says gruffly. He stomps into the kitchen and starts pouring out a glass of orange juice.

Sam looks between the two of them. “…yeah? Everyone’s got a soulmate.”

Steve shakes his head. “You remember how you told me about those people who think Tony’s been covering his mark?”

He doesn’t have to say anything else. Understanding dawns on Sam’s face and he breathes, “He’s got an alive soulmate.”

“Worse than that,” Bucky mutters as he comes back into the living room. “His soulmate rejected him.”

Sam’s quiet for a long moment before he asks, “So are you waiting or are you not going to ask him anymore?” Neither Steve nor Bucky reply. Sam nods grimly. “You should probably figure that out.”

Steve waits until Sam’s left before blurting out, “I think we’ve got a third.”

“What?”

“Another soulmate. I’ve thought that since my mark changed. I never wanted to tell you because I knew how hard it was on you that our marks didn’t match anymore.”

Bucky leans back against the breakfast bar and sips at his juice. “You never looked for them?” he asks, sounding genuinely curious.

Steve sighs deeply. He’s a little relieved that Bucky just believes him without asking anything more but god, he wishes the circumstances were different. He wishes he could be telling him this because they’ve just found out that Tony’s their third, not because they’ve just realized that they can’t have Tony. “I didn’t want to,” he says. “I had you and you were more than enough, you always were.”

“I didn’t think I was,” Bucky confesses and Steve knows that. He’s known that since Bucky first saw the mark but Bucky’s never actually told him that before. “I thought I was good enough to be Steve Rogers’ soulmate but not Captain America’s.”

He goes quiet for a long moment, eyes lingering on Steve’s mark. “Captain America’s soulmate couldn’t be a killer,” he says softly.

“That wasn’t-”

“I’m not talkin’ about the Winter Soldier, Steve. I was a sniper during the war and I was a damn good one.” He holds up a hand to stop Steve’s words. “I’m not ashamed of it, not anymore, but people didn’t look too kindly on snipers.” He rubs his hand over his own mark, hidden under a thick Henley and takes a deep breath and then it’s like he can’t stop the words from tumbling out, like he’s been waiting a long time to say them. “I was a killer long before you came for me. I killed boys younger than me, younger than _Becca_ , and I killed men old enough to be have grandkids running around their yard and I know that what they were doing wasn’t right but-” He stops and scrubs his metal hand over his face. “But that didn’t mean they deserved to be killed by someone they couldn’t even see with a bullet in their back and the ground rushin’ up to meet ‘em. And there you were and- Christ, Stevie, but you were _gorgeous_. Do you have any idea how beautiful you were, slinging that shield with that fire in your eyes?”

He sinks down onto a barstool. Steve’s frozen, unable to say anything. He’s never heard any of this. He’d known back then that things had gone wrong somewhere, that Bucky had been hiding things from him, but there had been a war and he hadn’t been able to give him the devotion he had deserved. He should have- should have insisted on taking the time to prove to him how much he loved him but he hadn’t and then they’d run out of time.

“We were all down there in the muck,” Bucky says, “and it was like you came along and pulled us out, dragged us up to be with you. You made us better, made us _want_ to be better- and  I hated it so fucking much because there you were with your shield and your movies and your gorgeous, _awful_ mark that didn’t match mine. I always knew how incredible you were but you became Captain America and, suddenly, everyone else could see it too. You were supposed to be mine and you weren’t. I had to share you with Agent Carter and Colonel Phillips and Howard fucking Stark and that mark was like the universe was telling me that I wasn’t enough anymore, that you were destined for greater things than me.

“Sometimes, I’d wish you would have left me to die in Azzano.”

Steve takes in a shuddering breath. He can feel the hot tears sliding down his cheeks. He can’t be bothered to stop them. He hasn’t cried for Bucky since the day he fell, not when he’d woken up in a new century or when he’d found out he was still alive or when he’d seen him again for the first time at Clint’s farm. But he cries now.

He can’t stop himself from kneeling in front of him, taking his hands, and pressing soft kisses to them. “I loved you _so much_ ,” he whispers. “I know I didn’t tell you enough but I adored you. I had all these plans, was gonna tell you every day ‘til I knew you believed me, knew that you were enough- _are_ enough- and I will always regret that I wasn’t able to do that for you. But I loved you then, I love you now, and I will love you until the day we die. You’re _mine_ and you always will be.”

And then Bucky’s dropping to the ground in front of him, kissing him fiercely like he can kiss the words out of Steve’s mouth and keep them for himself. Steve thinks that he’ll let him, thinks that he’ll keep telling him until he finally believes him.

* * *

Bucky’s draped across Steve’s chest, drawing little circles around his nipples. They hadn’t bothered to move from the floor to the bedroom and Steve has the absent thought that he doesn’t know if their come can stain the hardwood floors but he should probably get up to clean it, just in case.

He doesn’t.

He tightens his arm around Bucky’s waist and whispers, “I love you.”

Bucky looks up at him and smiles, the first time Steve’s seen him smile since they realized Tony’s got a mark. “I love you too.”

“But we were supposed to be talking about Tony.”

Bucky groans and rolls over onto his back. “Ew,” he says immediately and squirms away, leaving a streak of come across the floor. “Wet.”

Steve stands, figuring that if he can’t have Bucky draped over him then he might as well clean up their mess. “So conscientious,” Bucky mutters as he eyes him wetting a rag but stands too and gathers up their clothes. “You think we’ve got a third.”

“Yeah,” Steve agrees. He wipes the rag across Bucky’s stomach, grinning as he tries to wriggle away from the wet touch, and then bends down to start cleaning the floor. “I didn’t want to look for them. I had you and I didn’t want anything more and then you fell and I couldn’t bear the thought of finding someone else. Then I went into the ice and came back out thinking that they’d probably already died.”

“And then there was Tony,” Bucky finishes.

“Yeah,” he says again. “There was Tony.”

“We could still ask him,” Bucky points out. But it’s clear from the expression on his face that he knows just as well as Steve that that’s not an option anymore. They can’t tease Tony with what he can’t have.

“For what it’s worth,” Bucky begins. He stops and rights one of the barstools. It wobbles slightly and Steve has the vague memory of reaching out and knocking it but Bucky had tightened around him at that moment and he doesn’t remember precisely what he’d done.

“For what it’s worth?” he prompts.

“I’ve been thinking about a third since that interview we did with Jimmy Fallon.” He shrugs. “I’ll be honest, I thought it was Tony. _Fuck_ , I’d hoped it was Tony but I think you’re right. I think we’ve got another soulmate out there.”

Steve nods slowly. He’s not going to lie to himself; he’d hoped it was Tony too. But they would never reject him and he hopes- _prays_ \- that Tony knows that, if it had been them, he wouldn’t have to be alone.

“We could find them,” he says quietly.

“Because we can’t have Tony?” Bucky asks. “How’s that fair to our soulmate?”

“I didn’t say it was fair. But- Buck, they’re our _soulmate_. What we feel for Tony won’t hold a candle to what we feel for them.”

Bucky taps his fingers against his wrist. His mouth twists and he says, “I don’t want to forget how I feel about Tony.”

“I don’t want to either. He gave me- us- a home. More than anything, I wish he could be ours. I want to _tell_ him he could be ours.”

“But it’s not fair to him,” Bucky finishes.

“It’s not,” Steve agrees. “And it’s not fair to us that we feel this way. Best we can do about it now is deal with it.”

* * *

They go to Nat, reelected as the Avengers’ leader, to tell her that they think they’ve got a third soulmate and they want to find them. She gets this odd gleam in her eyes like she knows something they don’t when they tell her but then again, Nat often looks like she knows something they don’t so they don’t worry too much about it.

She lets them finish and then props her feet up on her desk when they finish, crossing one ankle over the other. “You know there’s a lot of people who would love to be your soulmate right?” she asks. She doesn’t have to say that there’s a lot of people who would see nothing wrong with faking their mark. It goes without saying.

Bucky nods. “But we’ve been careful. I don’t think anyone’s seen our mark.”

Nat doesn’t argue. “How do you want to handle this? Press conference, interview, statement?”

“We were thinking a statement,” Steve says. “It’s harder to fake than an interview.”

She hums consideringly. “It does sound like something out of a storybook. I’ll have one of Tony’s people prepare it. Should be ready within the week for you to look over. What about responses? Ask them to email you pictures of their marks?”

Steve grimaces and Bucky says, “That’s kinda impersonal, don’tcha think?”

“No? It’s a lot safer than- I don’t know- meeting with them.” She catches the look they gave each other and groans. Her head drops into her hands. “You want to meet with them.”

“Takes a lot of courage to put themselves out there like this,” Steve says. “Least we could do is meet them.”

“We all know you’re gonna vet ‘em, anyway,” Bucky finishes.

“You two are gonna be the death of me,” Nat mutters.

They chorus, “Thanks, Nat.”

* * *

There’s a press release out and an email set up to receive offers (thethird@starkindustries.net) within the week. The email crashes in an hour. Nat gets a second one set up and then a third and then a fourth. JARVIS is so busy vetting applicants that he takes almost five seconds to respond to Clint’s request to queue up _Game of Thrones_ , a first for the AI. They specifically ask people to refrain from sending in pictures of their marks but that doesn’t stop about a quarter of the original applicants. Steve feels a little bad about deleting their emails without even reading them but honestly, if they couldn’t even follow basic directions then they didn’t deserve a response.

Nat takes particular pleasure in deleting the ones that obviously came from supervillains. “Did you know that Brock Rumlow is still alive?” she asks as she viciously presses delete on his email.

“That fucker is still alive?” Sam shouts. He makes a grab for the tablet. “Gimme that! I’m gonna kick his ass!”

“Whose ass are we kicking?” Tony asks as he wanders through on his way to the kitchen.

“Brock Rumlow’s,” Steve says. “He didn’t have the decency to die when we took down SHIELD.”

“What a dick,” Tony replies mildly. “Why does it matter?”

“’Cause he’s trying to claim he’s mine and Stevie’s soulmate,” Bucky says, glancing up as he deletes an email from someone with the last name Kilgrave. He doesn’t know for certain who the guy is but he doubts that anyone with that last name is a decent sort of person. There’s giving someone the benefit of the doubt and then there’s sheer stupidity and meeting someone named Kilgrave definitely falls into the latter category.

“Soulmate?” Tony asks.

Steve pauses as he types a reply to a young girl from Ohio, thanking her for her reply but thirteen years old is far too young for him and Bucky and if she still thinks she’s their soulmate in five years, she can contact them then.

“Steve and Bucky think they’ve got a third,” Nat says before he can say anything.

Tony sounds a little strangled when he says, “A third?”

“Yup,” she says, popping the p. She puts her tablet down and stands. “Since you’re up here, I wanted to talk to you about that algorithm you’re running for the scepter.” She follows him into the kitchen and out of earshot. Sam promptly steals her tablet.

“That went better than I thought it would,” Bucky says gloomily.

Steve can’t help but agree. He knows that it’s ridiculous to have hoped that Tony would declare his undying love for them upon hearing that they’re looking for their third but that’s exactly what he’d hoped would happen.

“Captain Rogers,” JARVIS says. “I think you should stop Sergeant Wilson from sending his email to Mr. Rumlow.”

“Sam, no!” Steve yelps and lunges for the tablet.

* * *

The problem is, Steve and Bucky both are highly attractive superheroes. It’s been said by more than one person that it would be an honor to be the soulmate of even just one of them. But both?

Nat hands them her tablet compiled with every person who could possibly be a match.

“There’s over three thousand people on here,” Bucky says, stunned.

“I’ve got your date nights planned for the next fifteen years,” she says.

“That’s if we’re meeting them every single day?” Steve asks.

“Do you want to?” she asks in return. “Because I thought you’d like days off to do movie nights with the team or dates by yourself, maybe a mission or two. You’ll probably need some time to yourself, you know, with three thousand people to meet.”

Steve gives her an annoyed glance. “Yes, we get it.”

Her face softens slightly. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think it’ll take you fifteen years to find your third. I don’t even think it’ll take you one.”

Steve can’t help the hopeful flutter that goes through his heart at her knowing words. “You really think so?”

She smiles warmly. “I do.”

* * *

Their first date is an unmitigated disaster. Nat sends them a young woman named Rosie Allen from some little town in Ohio. They meet her at a coffeeshop near the tower. She’s waiting outside and smiles brightly when she sees them. Rosie’s pretty enough in a girl-next-door kind of way with her blonde princess curls and sky blue eyes but the only thing that flits through Steve’s mind when he sees her is that she’s not Tony.

“I hope you don’t mind,” she says. “I told the newspaper from back home that I might be your soulmate so they sent someone out to take pictures.”

Steve, in the process of opening the door for her, is blinded by the flash of the camera and nearly faceplants into her chest.

The date goes downhill from there. Rosie, despite them trying to stop her, pulls her sleeve up less than five minutes into the date and then bursts into tears when Bucky informs her that the vines on her wrist don’t match their mark. She asks to see theirs but Tony had told them emphatically not to show anyone their mark (“They’ll come back and claim that it changed and you won’t have any proof to claim otherwise.”). When they refuse, she dumps their coffees on their laps and storms out. The reporter she asked to come gets a wonderful picture of Bucky pulling his pants away from his dick.

It makes the front page news the next morning.

* * *

Tony finds them as they’re trying to drown their sorrows in the Asgardian mead Thor got them for Christmas. “Can I ask you a question?” he asks as he passes them both glasses of water.

“D’you hav’ to?” Steve slurs, trying to focus. He doesn’t think it’s realistic that there’s two Tonys in the room but he can’t be certain.

Tony laughs and guides the water to his mouth. It only sloshes a little. Steve’s pretty sure that that’s a significant accomplishment and he tells Tony so. Tony laughs harder. “Why are you doing this?” he asks as he tries to help Bucky do the same. The water spills down Bucky’s front.

“We’re no’ com- comp- whole,” Steve tells him. “We wanna be whole.” He smiles at Tony. “We coul’ be whole.”

Tony smiles back at him softly. “We will be,” he promises. He guides them back to their room and helps them in to bed. “Did you know,” he begins as he pulls the sheets up, “that Uncle Gabe said your marks didn’t match?”

“They did,” Steve says. “An’ then mine changed. Buck’s di’nt ‘til he fell.”

Tony glances over at where Bucky’s already snoring. “Steve?” he asks, a little hesitantly. “You’ll wait for me, right?”

Steve doesn’t know what he’s talking about but he nods eagerly even as he feels his lids getting heavy.

“Promise me,” Tony whispers. He bends down and brushes the softest of kisses across Steve’s lips. Steve thinks he should probably be ecstatic about this but he’s so, _so_ tired. “Promise me you’ll wait.”

He’s asleep before he can promise.

He wakes the next morning feeling soft and warm but unable to remember the night before.

* * *

The next date’s a little bit better. At least this one, Ryan Davies, waits until the end of the date before showing them the ship on their arm and they’re a lot more graceful about Steve politely telling them that they’re not the one.

It goes on from there. Every couple of days, Nat hands them a tablet with the information about the person they’ll be seeing that day. She’s kind enough to switch up the dates. They go out for breakfast, for lunch, for dinner. She sends them to Coney Island, to Michelin-starred restaurants, to stables upstate. For international applicants, she gives them the information a day early and puts them on a plane. They meet teachers, stockbrokers, firefighters, actors, politicians. Sometimes, their dates are private. Sometimes, they’re so publicized Steve wants to reject them before they even show him their mark.

After the Rosie Allen debacle, they tell every date to wait until the end to show them their mark. Not every date listens but most do and when the date doesn’t listen, he and Bucky always offer to see the date out through the end.

They have good dates and they have bad dates. It’s a little overwhelming experiencing them so quickly. Steve can’t help but wonder if it would have been like this if he hadn’t found Bucky so early. Sometimes, he thinks they might have rushed into this after the heartbreak of finding out that Tony is unavailable but it’s too late for him to be having second thoughts like this.

They’re six months into this dating thing when they finally reach a date that absolutely neither of them wants to go on. Nat’s been on a mission for the last few days with Sam and Sharon, who’s since given up all pretense of working for the CIA, and she leaves it to Clint to get them the information. Except Clint completely forgets to give them the tablet in the morning and it’s not until they’re walking out the door that he tells them they’re dining at Le Bernardin.

 They both freeze in the door. “Le Bernardin?” Steve asks hesitantly. Nat couldn’t have known. She couldn’t possibly have known that Le Bernardin was the restaurant they’d been planning to take Tony to all those months ago because he refuses to believe that she would do something like this to them.

Clint shrugs. “That’s what it says. See you when you get back.” He waves and wanders into one of the gyms.

As a first, they reach the restaurant before whoever their date is. It’s a little odd but neither of them minds because this gives them to compose themselves and move past the fact that the only person they ever wanted to bring here was Tony. They’re only waiting a few minutes though before they hear a cheerful, “Sorry I’m late.”

And this- this is too cruel because Steve finds it impossible to believe that Nat gave them a night off from their dates, only to send them out to a restaurant they planned to take Tony to- with Tony.

Tony grins as he slides into the seat across from them. “I got caught up in the plans for Sam’s new wings. He’s been complaining about them sticking and then, you know, New York traffic’s the worst.”

He looks absolutely wonderful in a tuxedo that looks like it was made for him (Steve tells himself that it probably was). He clearly didn’t have time to style his hair and it curls softly around his ears. His eyes are bright and shining in the restaurant lighting. He’s so beautiful it aches to look at him but Steve finds that he can’t tear his eyes away. This is everything that he’s wanted for three years with Bucky beside him and Tony sitting across.

“Have you been here before?” Tony chatters. “They make the most incredible merluza. It’s got these saffron potatoes and-”

“Thank god it’s just you,” Bucky blurts out. All three of them freeze. Bucky looks horrified but Steve’s looking at Tony who, for a second, looks incredibly hurt before it’s wiped away by a blank expression.

“ _Just_ me?” Tony asks lightly.

Bucky swallows hard and coughs before seizing his water. He drinks half of it in one gulp. Steve knows that he’s doing some very fast thinking, knows that he doesn’t want Tony to know how much they wish this was a real date, but he doesn’t think that Tony knows that.

“It’s been tiring is all,” Bucky says finally. Tony raises an eyebrow. “We’ve been doing this for six months, hardly any break. It’s just nice to get a night off.”

“Oh,” Tony says, going quieter. “A night off, of course that’s what you meant. Of course you’d be tired of the dates.” He hesitates. “I could leave- if you two want time to yourself.”

“Nope,” Steve says. “Just ‘cause this is a nice place doesn’t mean you can’t come here with friends.”

“Friends,” Tony repeats, so softly it’s clearly meant to be to himself. He nods a little. “Friends.”

Steve has to stop himself from begging for it to be real.

* * *

They don’t see Tony again before their next date. The morning after their night at Le Bernardin, he gets an urgent call from Pepper calling him out to one of their satellites in India. He grimaces as he informs Steve, de facto leader in Nat’s absence, that the head of the office out there hired on contractors for a project and is now refusing to pay them.

“I’d fire him from here,” he says. “But he’s been with the company since Howard set up shop and Pep thinks he deserves me going out there to fire him personally.”

Nat comes back before Tony returns and looks surprised when they ask her who’s next. “Next? You haven’t found them yet?” she asks.

Steve laughs tiredly. “We’ve only been on one date since you left.”

“One,” she mouths silently. She glances down at her tablet. “Sorry, you’ve been on so many I guess I’ve lost track.”

She passes them the tablet. “Ophelia Sarkissian. Twenty-two years old, Hungarian born but immigrated to the states as an infant, currently employed as a kindergarten teacher in Pennsylvania.”

Ophelia Sarkissian is lovely judging by her picture. Black hair, green eyes, a scar bisecting her face and Steve wonders what happened to her, when it happened. She’s got a gorgeous smile that lights up her whole face. It’s the kind of smile that makes other people want to smile too.

They meet her for dinner that night at a small diner in Brooklyn. She’s already waiting for them at a table when they walk in. She spots them immediately and waves them over. “Hi,” she says cheerfully. “Ophelia but my friends call me Fee. And I already know who you are obviously. I can’t believe this day is actually here; I’ve been longing for it since you announced you were looking for your third.”

She offers her hand for them to shake. Steve notes absently that it’s a nice handshake, firm, not too long. He’s a bit more distracted by the way she’s wearing a band around her wrist despite her short-sleeved dress. Every other date they’ve been on where the date in question wore short sleeves, their mark’s been uncovered. It’s a nice change.

Fee chats to them while they wait for their food, tells them about the teaching she does, gushes about the kids she works with. It’s clear that she loves the kids very dearly. She asks them just as many questions about their work and they find themselves sharing stories with her that they haven’t told any of their other dates. There’s just something about her that makes people want to open up.

“Is it hard, teaching?” Steve asks.

She wiggles her head from side to side. “It’s got its moments like any job. The other day, one of the kids was on the playground, caught their thumb on a rusted nail, and here the parents are threatening to sue! Like I get it, they’re worried about their kid but it’s not really my fault. I’ve got thirty kids. I can’t watch all of them at one time.”

“I can understand that,” Bucky says. “Just last week, we got hate mail for not being there when this man’s dog ran out into the street and got hit by a car. He was in Texas, by the way.”

“So where were you?”

“In Missouri, helping out after a tornado.”

The conversation flows easily from one topic to the next and they wind up talking about popular culture. Much like the other Avengers, Fee doesn’t judge them for not having caught up on everything yet.

“I’m not even caught up and I was only born twenty-two years ago!” she says with a grin.

“Exactly!” Steve says. He’s grinning just as broadly as she is. “If _you’re_ not caught up, how can we be expected to be?”

“Ooh, have you seen _Seventeen_ with Jackie Cooper? It’s one of my favorite comedies. I used to watch it all the time when I was a kid.”

“You sure it’s your favorite?” Bucky teases. He too is smiling, which is almost odd for these dates. “Doesn’t seem like it or you’d know that it came out before either of us fell. We saw it.”

Fee looks intrigued and she whips out her phone to check the date. “Damn,” she comments and doesn’t look at all chagrined when Bucky laughs at her. “You’re right.”

It turns out that she likes to go running too (“But only at daybreak. There’s just something so magical about running at dawn. It’s like the city’s coming back to life.”). She tells them about her two dogs (“They won’t sleep anywhere other than my bed though. It’s the worst. If I wanted to wake up sweating, I’d sleep next to the furnace. But I love them to pieces though. I’ve had Silly Goose since I was twelve and Dodger since I was nine.” “Oh, are you a Dodgers fan?”). She doesn’t mind when they ask about her adoption (“My birth dad’s still alive. I’ve met him a few times. My mom died of cancer when I was only a few months old. They thought it was benign and it was too late to save her life when they realized it wasn’t and I guess I look like her because my birth dad couldn’t bear to keep me around.”) or when they indirectly bring up her scar (“My freshman homecoming- did you all have homecoming back then? I tripped over my dress, landed on the corner of the sidewalk. My poor date had to take me to the hospital.”)

She leans over and swipes one of Bucky’s fries. “You know, when I heard you guys were looking for your third, I thought it was fate,” she says. “I’ve been looking for my one for so long, I thought it was never gonna happen.”

“You’re still young,” Steve points out gently.

Fee shrugs. “Sure but no one wants a soulmate who’s scarred. Everyone wants someone pretty.”

“Your scar doesn’t make you ugly,” Bucky argues.

“Conventional beauty standards say otherwise but thanks. Anyway, you actually saved my adopted granddad’s life back in ’43. It wasn’t one of your HYDRA missions so no one ever hears about it but there was this train. They locked up nearly a hundred people in this freight car-”

Bucky straightens. “They were gonna blow up the train,” he says. “I remember.”

“And you guys stopped it.”

Bucky smiles softly and reaches across the table to take her hand. “I’m glad we could help.”

She smiles back, looking a little shy for the first time all night. “If you don’t mind, I’m gonna hit the bathroom before the diner closes. It’s a long walk back to my hotel.”

“We’ll walk with you,” Bucky says immediately. He turns to Steve the moment she’s gone and says, “I like her.”

“I do too,” Steve admits. “She might be the nicest person we’ve dated so far. Wish they could all be like her.”

“No, Stevie, I _like_ her. You said it would be like my feelings for Tony don’t hold a candle to it and that’s how it feels. I think she’s it.”

Steve isn’t so convinced but he’s also known Tony a lot longer. It would make sense that his feelings for Tony would be stronger than Bucky’s so he nods when Bucky says he wants to ask her to take off her band instead of waiting for her to take the initiative.

Fee’s eyes widen when they ask. “Oh!” she says surprised. “Would you believe I forgot all about it?” Her band is more like a bracelet with a clasp and she struggles with it for a moment before holding it out. “Would you…?”

Bucky reaches for it. “’Course,” he says easily. His fingers linger on her wrist and she shivers minutely. Steve shoots him a quick glare because he still isn’t seeing what Bucky’s seeing but then her band is off and her mark is revealed and there’s nothing he can say because- because Bucky’s right. He knows this mark, knows it intimately well.

He looks at the red and gold phoenix rising from the blue flames on her wrist and realizes they’ve finally found their third.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a brief warning, Steve and Bucky decide to search for their third soulmate because they think they can't have Tony. I personally don't condone going out with someone just because you can't have someone else but Steve and Bucky are only human and they do make mistakes.


	6. Like a Painting That's Been Turned 'Round

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Tony attempts to tell his soulmates about his mark, meets a kitty cat, and uncovers a nefarious plan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First and foremost, thank you for all of the wonderful comments on the last chapter. I had so much fun talking to all of you about what you thought about it and your theories on where the next chapters would go and especially getting to talk about your thoughts on characterizations in the MCU.  
> Sorry this chapter took so long getting out but your comments were really thought provoking and I spent almost three weeks having to think about where I wanted this story to go and then replan my outline. This story took a major turn from the direction it was supposed to go all the way back in chapter 4 and now that we've gotten here and I've read your thoughts, I wanted to reevaluate if the story I was writing actually fit with what I'd originally envisioned it to be (and the answer was, not at all- not that there's anything wrong with that).  
> I'm still not entirely happy with this chapter and it's entirely possible that I'll come back at a later date and edit it but I'm currently working without a beta and I'm tired of staring at it so I'm going to post it anyway.  
> I look forward to reading your comments :)

Tony’s pretty much spent the last few weeks locked in his lab (ever since Steve and Bucky stopped looking at him) so he thinks he can be excused for being surprised when Nat tells him that Steve and Bucky are looking for their third.

“A third?” he asks, voice only a little strangled.

“Yup,” Nat says, putting down her tablet and standing. “Since you’re up here, I wanted to talk to you about that algorithm you’re running for the scepter.” And then she all but grabs his arm and forcibly drags him into the kitchen and out of earshot of the others.

“What’s going on?” he says lowly, rubbing his arm a little.

“They came to me last week. Said they think they’ve got a third and they wanted to look for them.”

“You didn’t…?” He trails off and turns around to start heating up a can of soup, unsure of how to ask if she told them without making it sound like he doesn’t trust her.

She shrugs casually. “Not my place- or decision.”

He snaps his head back around. “Decision?”

She nods. “You don’t have to tell them,” she points out. “And you definitely don’t have to tell them right now. You of all people know that soulmates don’t have to end up together.”

Tony can’t stop himself from glancing at her bare wrist. He knows it’s rude, knows how much he hates it when people do that to him but he can’t stop himself. “Do you remember it?” he asks quietly.

“No,” Nat says, shaking her head. “I think maybe there was a little bit of pink?”

“When did they die?” he says curiously. He’s just now realizing that, in the five years he’s known her, he’s never once asked what happened to her mark. It’s not generally a polite thing to ask unless you’re very close with the person you’re asking. He’s pretty sure he’s been that close to her for ages but he’s honestly never thought to ask.

“I don’t know that they have,” she admits. “The Red Room thought that soulmates were a distraction. Our marks were removed when we turned five.”

His eyes widen in horror. He knows that he’s openly gaping at her but that’s the worst thing he’s ever heard. Sure, plenty of people end up with someone who isn’t their soulmate but to have the choice completely taken away from you? He can’t imagine it. He holds out his hand to her, waits for her to take it, and then tugs her into a hug.

He murmurs, “I’m so sorry,” into her hair and presses a quick kiss there.

“I try to tell myself it’s a comfort,” she says firmly but Tony can hear the thickness in her voice. “There’s a lot of red in my ledger.”

“And there’s a lot in mine,” Tony agrees. He nods toward the living room where Steve and Bucky are answering emails. “But they’re still looking for me.”

* * *

He goes to Bruce.

“Not that kind of doctor,” Bruce tells him.

“Yes thank you, Bones,” Tony says snidely. He pulls out a book from the bookshelf in Bruce’s lab and then removes the folder on soulmarks hidden behind it. He waves it in the air for a second. “But you still know more about them than I do.”

Bruce sighs and rests his head in his hands. “You know, India was less stressful than you.”

Tony resists sticking his tongue out at him. “Please, Brucie,” he pleads. “I don’t know who else to ask.”

A beat- then- “We don’t know a lot about multiple soulmates.”

Tony cheers and throws himself into the other chair. Bruce smiles at him fondly and then pulls up a couple holographic screens and spins them toward him. “I’ve looked into it a bit- because Betty’s actually got two marks, one for me and one for the Other Guy so it begs the question if the Hulk is a person all on his own.”

He hadn’t known that. He’d had the chance to meet Dr. Ross a few months after the Battle of New York but she hadn’t had two marks then. But then again, he supposes she might have purchased one of the SKINs.

“Of course he’s his own person,” he says instead. “I wouldn’t have given him a floor otherwise.”

Bruce gives him one of those smiles that makes him feel all warm and fuzzy inside, not that he’d ever admit it. “There are all sorts of legends about multiple soulmates, usually when people can’t agree on which couple should have been together- Arthur, Guinevere, and Lancelot from Arthurian mythos; Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Peter depending on which Biblical scholar you talk to; Greek mythology _really_ liked the idea. The first instance of what we believe to be multiple soulmates- at least, in recorded history and not legend- occurs between Jacob, Rachel, and Leah of the Tanakh. But it’s a controversial account. Jacob’s said to have only wanted Rachel, not Leah, which doesn’t make sense if they were soulmates as history claims.

“It’s hard to prove whether or not multiple soulmates exist. We’re so caught up in this idea of soulmates and becoming complete when we meet them that most of us don’t even stop to think if we’re actually complete. There could be thousands of people out there with multiple soulmates and we don’t even know.”

“And the fakes,” Tony says quietly.

Bruce nods. “Those too. We don’t have the technology to prove what’s a fake and what isn’t; tattoos have existed as long as we’ve been able to mark up our skin. We like to think that soulmark tattoos are used only to memorialize soulmates but that whole thing with that one couple and the third- who was it?”

“Brad, Angelina, and Jennifer.”

“Right, them- proved that people can- and do- fake marks.”

“Someone tried to fake my mark once,” Tony comments conversationally. He’s not trying to start anything. After all, it’s not exactly uncommon for people to try to fake celebrities’ marks. Tony had, once upon a time before he turned twenty, been quite the catch.

Bruce, however, looks intrigued. “I didn’t know you ever went around with your mark uncovered.”

Tony shrugs. “I did until I was ten.” He doesn’t add that that had been when Rumiko with the red rose on her wrist had asked him what was wrong with his. “We were at school together. His dad had a design that Howard wanted to buy. Howard was really pushing for full rights, wouldn’t settle for anything less. Two weeks later, his kid showed up with my mark on his wrist. He usually wore a band so it wasn’t like we should have known otherwise. I don’t know if the guy thought that if his kid had my mark, Howard would have let him keep the rights or if he was just trying to get as much money as he could.”

Bruce hums thoughtfully. “How’d you know it was a fake?”

Tony shifts uneasily. He doesn’t really like admitting that he had a defective mark for most of his life, especially when it would become obvious who his soulmate is. He’s sure that Bruce of all people won’t judge him but it’s a secret that he’s kept for so long. He isn’t ready for that secret to get out yet.

“We knew,” he says instead, putting as much conviction in his voice as he can. “Howard sicced SI’s legal department on them. They found this old photo of the kid with his original mark. The physical copy had been destroyed but it showed up on some website. It was one of the first times we saw that things on the Internet don’t go away. The guy lost the court case and the rights. Poor kid’s mark was gone and everyone thought that he was just trying to get a bit of fame. He was gone from the school a few days later; it was a mess.”

“And you started wearing a band.”

He hesitates. “Yeah,” he says eventually. He’d been nine when all of this happened. He wouldn’t start wearing the band for another year but it was close enough.

“What’s got you so interested in multiple soulmates?” Bruce asks absently. He’s closing down the other screens, pulling up some sort of protein structure, so he doesn’t see Tony flinch.

“Steve and Bucky thinking they’ve got a third,” he says as casually as he can manage.

Bruce nods understandingly. “It does seem kind of fantastic, doesn’t it? But I’m not surprised.”

Tony looks up from where he’s fiddling with one of Bruce’s chemical models. “You’re not?”

“They’re not the same people they were when they met.”

“You could argue that of anyone,” Tony points out, gesturing broadly with a beaker he’d picked up off of Bruce’s desk.

“You could- put that down, it can explode.”

“And you have it on your desk?”

“…put that in the fume hood.” He watches as Tony blithely ignores him (what’s science without a little risk?) and then carries it over himself. “You could argue it but there’s a big difference between the average soulmate pair changing over the years and how Steve and Bucky changed. I’m a little surprised that they even jumped right back into their relationship without taking the time to get to know each other as they are now.”

Tony inclines his head, conceding the point.

“I’m not surprised that they would need something like a buffer. Not that I’m reducing their soulmate to just a buffer. I’m sure they’ll love their soulmate just as much as they do-” Bruce cuts off and sneezes. “-just as much as they do each other.”

* * *

It’s just- Tony’s never even considered that he could be the soulmate of both Steve _and_ Bucky. It isn’t like he’d never acknowledged that he shared their mark but he’d spent most of his life with a defective mark. The way he sees it, a mark that matches someone who isn’t his soulmate isn’t out of the realm of possibility.

He’d kept quiet about the whole thing after Steve had brought Bucky home, after he’d seen how happy Steve was, after he’d started wondering if he’d ever seen Steve truly happy before Bucky had reappeared or if it had always been a pale imitation. He’d kept quiet through the long months of Bucky appearing in his bed for comfort, through him showing up in the workshop to talk, through the hours upon hours of working on the arm. He’d kept quieter still when he’d realized that he was falling deeply in love with Bucky as well as Steve. Kept quiet and told himself that there was no room for him there.

They had his mark but he didn’t have theirs.

But he listens as Steve chatters excitedly about what he thinks their soulmate will be like, watches as Bucky nods along silently. They’re looking for him. They _want_ him. Sure, they don’t know that it’s him. That scares him a little because he thinks that they might have been moving toward something before they’d caught the glimpse of his mark and they’d started pulling away (and he still doesn’t get why they’d done that) but he’s sure that they’ll explain it once they realize that he is theirs and they are his.

If he tells them.

He knows that Nat thinks he should. He can sense it in the way she studies him when Steve and Bucky are talking about their soulmate. And it isn’t like he doesn’t want to. It’s more that it’s hard not to internalize your worthlessness when it’s something you’ve been told your entire life.

Tony can count on one hand the number of people who haven’t judged him for his mark and, unfortunately, that list doesn’t include Steve and Bucky. He hadn’t been lying when he’d said that his soulmate hadn’t wanted him. The moment Steve had said in the decontamination shower that Bucky had been his soulmate and never mind that he’d thought they had another, he’d rejected Tony.

But they’re looking for _him_.

And maybe they don’t know it. And maybe they’ll be disappointed when they find out. But maybe they won’t. Maybe they want it to be him. Maybe they won’t reject him this time.

* * *

Steve’s slurring his words. Bucky’s listing to one side. Tony can’t blame them though. He’d seen the picture of sweet Rosie Allen dumping their drinks in their laps. It’s already shaping up to be a PR nightmare. He’s sure that Steve and Bucky don’t care about that necessarily other than how it’ll create more work for Tony but it has to be hard on them. They’d said multiple times before their date how they weren’t expecting to meet their soulmate on the first try but Tony knows them. He knows that they’re romantics. They might not have been expecting it but they had certainly been hoping for it.

“Can I ask you a question?” he asks as he passes them both glasses of water.

“D’you hav’ to?” Steve asks. His eyes keep shifting between Tony and another spot about a foot to Tony’s right. He can’t help but wonder how many Tonys Steve is seeing at the moment.

He reaches out and helps Steve guide the water to his mouth. A little of it spills out the side. “Yay!” Steve cheers and promptly upends the rest of it on the carpet. Tony giggles.

“Why are you doing this?” he asks. Bucky’s water spills down his front. Tony tries very hard not to sigh.

“We’re no’ com-” Steve stops and frowns. “Comp-” he tries again and frowns harder. “Whole. We wanna be whole.” He smiles softly at Tony. “We coul’ be whole.” There’s an odd sort of emphasis when he says “we” like he’s including Tony in that statement.

Tony can’t stop himself by answering Steve’s smile with one of his own. “We will be,” he promises and makes his decision. He helps them back to their room and gets them into bed. Bucky tries to tug him down with them but he pulls away to grab extra blankets.

“Did you know that Uncle Gabe said your marks didn’t match?” He’s wondered about that since Steve had first said that Bucky was his soulmate. Uncharitably, he’d first thought that maybe it was just wishful thinking, that they weren’t actually the soulmates Steve claimed they were. But he’d been so ashamed of that thought that he hadn’t even voiced it to JARVIS. There was no reason for him to doubt Steve’s claim except his own selfish desires.

“They did,” Steve confirms. Tony looks away and fusses with the blanket. “An’ then mine changed. Buck’s di’nt ‘til he fell.”

He stills, scarcely able to breathe while he thinks about that. Their marks changed. Because they became superheroes. He’s sure that that’s not actually correct but it’s what his mind latches on to. They changed when they both set on the path that would lead them to the future- to Tony.

“Steve?” he asks. “You’ll wait for me, right?”

He can tell that Steve doesn’t know what he’s talking about even though he nods. It’s in the unfocused quality of his gaze, the heaviness of his lids.

“Promise me,” he whispers.

Steve won’t remember this in the morning. Tony’s been drunk enough times to know that. Maybe that’s what makes him brave enough to brush a soft kiss across Steve’s lips. He holds there for a long moment until Steve starts to kiss him back and then he stands up.

“Promise me you’ll wait.”

Steve’s asleep before he can reply. Tony stands at the door and watches his soulmates- _his_ _soulmates_ \- sleep. He nods firmly to himself.

He’s going to tell them.

* * *

“ _Or_ , and hear me out here,” Nat says. “You could not.”

Tony stares at her. “I thought you’d be happy for me,” he begins.

“And I am!” Nat says hastily. She shoves a freshly frosted cupcake into his hand. “Please don’t cry. Sharon doesn’t like it when you cry and then I’ll be dead.”

“Sharon won’t kill you.”

“No but she’ll hand me off to your aunt and _she_ would.” She shivers as if she’s picturing exactly how Aunt Peggy would kill her.

Tony says blankly, “Oh.” Then- “Why can’t I tell Steve and Bucky?”

Nat hops up to sit on the counter and grabs a cupcake to finish frosting it. “Picture this,” she says dramatically. Tony leans back against the opposite counter and raises an amused eyebrow. “They’re looking for their soulmate. They can’t find them. They go months and months and they’re starting to think that their soulmate isn’t out there or doesn’t want them. They’re ready to give up and then-”

“Don’t you have dates planned for the next fifteen years? Why would they be giving up after a few months?”

“Shush. And then you’re there, meeting them, and you tell them it’s you, it’s always been you. It’s everything they ever wanted and so you all live happily ever after.”

Tony blinks. He completely brushes aside the implication that Steve and Bucky had been planning on asking him out because that makes no sense. They wouldn’t have started looking for another soulmate if they were going to ask him out. That’s not what’s making him pause.

“Natasha. This isn’t a fairytale. This is real life. Please tell me you understand that. I’m worried that you don’t.”

She grins. “But Antoshka, it _is_ a fairytale. You thought your mark was defective. Steve’s changed. Bucky shouldn’t even _have_ one. It’s exactly like a fairytale and if you weren’t in it, you’d see that too.”

He sighs. She’s not entirely wrong. It does sound entirely fantastic. Tony’s never much enjoyed rom-coms, not with the way they would feature broken people without marks or with damaged marks or whatever who would somehow, against all odds, find their soulmate. If he looks at it like that, his life _does_ sound almost like a rom-com.

“And every story needs a dramatic moment, is that what you’re thinking?” he asks. She nods eagerly. “If this doesn’t work,” he tells her, “I’m telling them my way, got it?”

“It will,” she promises.

* * *

It doesn’t.

Tony spends the weeks leading up to the date agonizing over what he’s going to say, how he’s going to tell them, and then he sits down and both Steve and Bucky look vaguely horrified. So he starts babbling, telling them about the menu. He’s just getting ready to share with them the time he’d been here with Ty- which is the last thing he wants to talk about. Who wants to hear about their date’s past partners?

And then Bucky blurts out, “Thank god it’s just you.”

He freezes. Bucky freezes. Tony’s sure that it’s probably ridiculous to think that the entire world freezes in this single moment but that’s exactly how it feels. A wave of hurt washes over him before he can bury it. He can’t tell what’s going on in Bucky’s head. He doesn’t know if Bucky meant it, if he’s relieved that Tony’s here as a friend, if he’d been hoping that Tony’s mark would match theirs. Judging by the awful look on his face, he’s sure that Bucky didn’t mean to say it but he can’t imagine what he meant to say instead.

“ _Just_ me?” he asks as lightly as he can manage. He’s praying, desperately hoping, that Bucky misspoke, that he isn’t actually as disgusted by the thought of Tony being their soulmate as he looks.

Bucky’s draining half his glass in one gulp. It’s a stalling tactic, Tony knows it is, but he’s too scared of what’s going to happen next to call him out on it.

“It’s been tiring is all,” Bucky says. “We’ve been doing this for six months, hardly any break. It’s just nice to get a night off.”

He says quietly, “Oh. A night off, of course that’s what you meant. Of course you’d be tired of the dates.” He’s cold now, wishing that he’d brought a warmer coat. He should have known better than to think that Steve and Bucky would ever want him. He should have known that they’d just want to be friends. _Just_ , he thinks bitterly. _It’s just Tony. They’re just friends. This is just a night out at one of the best restaurants in the world._

He forces a smile to his face, pretending like nothing’s wrong, that his heart isn’t breaking. “I could leave- if you two want time to yourself,” he offers.

Steve’s almost too quick to say, “Nope. Just ‘cause this is a nice place doesn’t mean you can’t come here with friends.”

“Friends,” Tony repeats to himself. He thinks one last time of telling them anyway. If nothing else, he could stop their fruitless search. But a look of pure, naked relief flashes across Bucky’s face and Tony can’t bring himself to do it. They’re so hopeful to find their missing soulmate; he doesn’t want to be the one to erase that look in Bucky’s eyes, doesn’t want to see it replaced with disappointment. Something else crosses Steve’s expression but Tony tells himself that he’s just imagining that it’s despair.

“Friends,” he says one last time, tasting it on his tongue. He can be friends with them. He’ll take whatever he can get from them.

And if that means that they’ll spend the rest of their lives as just friends, then he’ll do that.

* * *

Tony can do the whole friends thing with Steve and Bucky but he can’t do it right now when his heart is freshly broken. He wants to scream his secret every time he so much as looks at them which means that he needs to get out of here.

He gets home from Le Bernardin and calls Pepper. “You gotta get me out of here, Pep,” he pleads. “I need out- I can’t- I _can’t-_ ” He’s going to break down if he keeps trying to force the words out.

Pepper understands him without him having to keep talking. “I need you in India,” she tells him. “I’ve got an office manager I need fired.”

“When can I leave?” he asks desperately.

“Tomorrow morning.”

He spends the night packing and thinking about what he’ll say to Steve, who’s serving as temporary team leader while Nat’s on a mission. He has to keep it light and breezy or else he’ll confess everything.

He wishes Nat were back. He wants to tell her about what happened, scream at her that this was her fault. He had just wanted to tell them, not go through this whole charade. There’s no way of knowing if it would have worked out any better if he’d just told them instead of the restaurant thing. Intellectually, he knows that but he can’t help but wonder if it would have been different if he’d told them the morning after their date with Rosie Allen rather than letting Nat talk him out of it.

* * *

India does absolutely nothing for his heartbreak except create some distance between him and Steve and Bucky. He’s there for three weeks: first to fire the manager, then to ensure that the contractors he hired got paid, and then to oversee the hiring process for the new manager. Bucky texts him regularly for the first two weeks and Steve calls him every night (“Just checking in on you, Shellhead.”). Fifteen days into his stay, everything- calls, texts, even emails- ceases. Tony tells himself that he’s not panicking but he absolutely is. He pulls up the news from his hotel room but there’s nothing about any sort of attacks, nothing going on at the tower. Everything looks completely normal.

He texts Bucky twice but never hears back from him. He calls Steve too but gets sent to voicemail. It takes him two days to decide to text Nat even though he’s not sure if she’s still on her mission. He gets back a terse, “I’m working on it.”

He thinks then about seeing if Rhodey would be willing to drop by the tower and look into whatever’s going on. But Rhodey doesn’t know how badly everything came crashing down. He’s sure that Rhodey won’t judge him for this latest fuckup but he’s equally sure that he’s not ready to talk about it. Rhodey will definitely make him talk about it- or maybe he’ll repulsor Steve and Bucky.

It probably says something about him that he’s not sure he’d mind if Rhodey repulsored them.

Pepper calls him the next day to ask him if he’ll go to Nairobi for an international robotics conference. “There’s a kid presenting her work there. I think you’ll like her,” she says.

“Yeah?” Tony asks, looking over the conference info Pepper had sent over.

“Yeah. She’s giving a poster presentation on environmentally friendly repulsor tech.”

Tony looks up from the packet to her projection on the TV screen. “It’s arc reactor technology. It’s already environmentally friendly.”

Pepper smiles. “She says it can be better.”

She’s right of course. Tony spends about two hours talking with Miss Williams (who’s young- too young- to be in college already) about her repulsor tech. He hands her his business card, tells her he’ll be in the states in a few days, and to call him when she gets back from the conference.

“We’ll talk patents,” he says.

“With my name on it,” she insists.

“Nothing less,” Tony agrees and wanders off to another poster. He likes her. She’s sarcastic and funny and too damn smart for her own good. It reminds him of a younger him before everything had gone so badly wrong.

“That was very kind of you,” someone says from beside him. Tony glances at the young man with the Xhosa accent falling into step next to him and then at the two women trailing a few paces behind them.

“Tony Stark,” he says.

“I know,” the man replies amusedly. “T’Challa, son of T’Chaka.”

Tony smiles. “I know.” He shoves his hands into his pockets. “I didn’t know Wakanda was taking an interest in robotics.”

“ _We_ are not. _My sister_ is.” He gestures toward a teenage girl talking eagerly with one of the presenters. The presenter looks a little overwhelmed, a little bit sheepish, and a lot bit irritated by her. Tony’s delighted. He doesn’t like the presenter so it’s nice to see someone else knock him down a peg.

“I didn’t know Wakanda knew anything about robotics,” he says casually.

It’s not entirely true. He’s long thought that a country as secretive as Wakanda with as valuable a resource as vibranium couldn’t possibly be as pastoral and primitive as they act. He’s seen what vibranium is capable of, both with Steve’s shield and his own arc reactor. He finds it impossible to believe that Wakanda hasn’t discovered those same properties. But the Wakandans never venture outside their borders and he’s curious to know what’s going on in their minds.

T’Challa is watching him through narrowed eyes. Tony blithely ignores him and stops to ask a few questions of a grad student with a poster on using drones in volatile situations. He’s sure that the kid doesn’t mean for it to be interpreted for combat, at least not judging by his examples of putting out fires, but it certainly comes across that way.

“What are you implying, Mr. Stark?” T’Challa asks lowly.

“Tony,” he replies. “Please. I’m not implying anything. I’m asking a question. You’ve presented yourself and your country a certain way. I don’t see why my face is recognizable on sight in a country without television.”

He can see that T’Challa is struggling to come up with an answer. In the meantime, they move on to another poster. “Wisely put,” he says eventually as he catches up to Tony.

Tony hums thoughtfully. “Is there a reason you’re following me around the conference instead of your sister? Not that I’m not flattered but-” He stops. He’d been getting ready to say that he’s taken but he isn’t, is he? He’d spent six months preparing to finally be able to say that he’s found his soulmates but it hadn’t worked out that way.

“But?” T’Challa prompts. There’s a heated gleam in his eyes that makes Tony shiver. Objectively speaking, T’Challa’s a very attractive man and it’s been years since Tony got any sort of attention that didn’t feel predatory.

“I thought there was someone,” he says simply.

“Ah.” There’s a world of understanding in his voice. Tony stops and takes another look at him. He’s rubbing ruefully at his wrist, hidden beneath a thick, beaded black bracelet. There’s a hurt expression in his eyes and Tony immediately gets it. He does. He sees that expression every time he looks in the mirror.

Tony asks sympathetically, “You too, huh?” He picks at the edge of the SKIN. “You want a drink? I want a drink. Come on. I’ll show you mine and all that.”

“Can you leave?”

He makes a show out of checking his watch. “Would you look at that? I’ve been here two hours. I met with who Pepper wanted me to meet. I’ve done my bit. I’m leaving. Can you?”

T’Challa glances back at his bodyguards. “Will you mind when they follow us?”

Tony looks at them as well. They’re serious and imposing but Tony works with very serious and imposing people all the time. He can work with that. “I don’t mind.” He leans in and whispers, “Do they talk though?”

They don’t that night though T’Challa assures him that they do. They don’t talk when Tony leads them down the street to a tiny dive bar that makes the best Manhattans Tony’s ever tasted. They don’t talk when one drink turns into two and then to five and then he loses count. They don’t talk when T’Challa runs a reverent finger over the phoenix on Tony’s wrist or when Tony strokes his thumb across the vibranium model on T’Challa’s.

They don’t talk when, drunk and tired and so heartsore he wants to be sick, Tony curls his hand behind T’Challa’s neck and pulls him forward far enough to kiss him. They don’t talk when T’Challa presses forward hungrily or when he hauls Tony up from his seat or when they trip their way down the street back toward the hotel. They don’t talk when T’Challa presses Tony into a corner of the elevator and lifts him so that Tony’s legs wrap around his waist. They don’t talk when Tony drags him down the hall to his room and they all but fall through the door because they can’t take their hands off each other long enough to properly open the lock.

They just watch silently and judge.

* * *

Tony wakes in the middle of the night to the low murmur of voices. It throws him off for a moment when he knows that he and T’Challa went to bed alone. Then he sees the low glow from beside him, a glow that he knows isn’t coming from the reactor. He rolls over.

There’s a small hologram rising from T’Challa’s bracelet. A young woman with short hair and bright eyes talking to him. It’s entirely fascinating, especially because Tony’s never seen anything like this. The holograms he makes from his own technology is similar but this is years ahead of anything he’s done.

All of it pales in comparison to the desperate want leaking from every pore of T’Challa’s being. He looks like he’d dive through the hologram if it meant he could be at her side. Tony can’t see the woman’s wrist on the hologram but he’d bet anything that her mark matches the vibranium model on T’Challa’s wrist.

“Are you alone?” she asks. Tony’s quick to close his eyes, leaving them just barely slit open to see.

T’Challa hesitates for a moment before saying, “No.” He looks down at Tony. “But Tony’s asleep.” There’s no fondness in his voice, nothing that says this was anything other than a drunken night together, and yet Tony can still see the way her eyes cloud over.

 _Too young_ , he thinks. _Too young to know such heartbreak_.

He misses the rest of the conversation because they switch to isiXhosa. He’s not offended; he suspects it’s meant to be private anyway. He’s just starting to drift back off when T’Challa switches to English.

“Nakia,” he says pleadingly. “When are you coming home?”

“There is work for me to do here. You know that,” she replies but Tony can hear the waver in her voice. She wants to be with T’Challa just as badly as she wants to do her work.

T’Challa sighs. “I do.” If the woman knows how resigned he is, she doesn’t say anything about it. She makes a crossing gesture with her arms that T’Challa echoes and then disappears.

After a moment, Tony offers, “She seems nice.” T’Challa closes his eyes briefly and sighs more deeply. “Is she yours?”

“Yes,” he answers immediately. “And no. She is my soulmate but she says she won’t be with me so long as her job takes precedence.”

Tony winces, thinking of all the times Howard had told him that SI was more important than his son. It’s different of course; Howard hadn’t been his soulmate. But the hurt’s the same. “What does she do?” he asks, intending on nothing more than some light conversation.

T’Challa, however, shuts down immediately. “She works for my father,” he says coolly.

Tony’s not stupid. He puts two and two together and comes up with, “She’s a spy.”

“Of course not,” T’Challa denies.

“Right,” Tony says drily. He backs down though.

“I hope you didn’t think,” T’Challa begins hesitantly and then stops.

Tony gives him an unimpressed look. “That this meant anything? Give me some credit. I was having one-night stands before you were born. Your heart belongs to your Nakia and mine belongs to… well, it belongs to someone else.”

His phone lights up with a text and he leans over T’Challa’s (very nice) body to pick it up. T’Challa is saying something, presumably some meaningless platitude about their night, which while appreciated is entirely unnecessary. Tony’s not paying any attention though. He’s focused on Nat’s text.

_Come home._

He stands and begins looking for his clothes. Helpfully, T’Challa hands him his shirt. “I have to go,” he explains. “Sorry. It’s- something’s wrong.”

* * *

 _Something_ is apparently Ophelia Sarkissian.

Nat meets him in the penthouse and tells him everything, finishing with “She’s got their mark.” She can’t keep from glancing at his own mark, once again covered by the SKIN.

“She’s got their mark,” Tony repeats dully. “She’s got their mark which she isn’t supposed to have because they were supposed to keep it quiet and it can’t be real because she’s not their fucking soulmate!” He’s screaming by the end of it but he can’t help it. He’s furious and tired and-

“All of this could have been avoided if you’d just let me talk,” he snaps, ignoring the way Nat flinches. “I could have told them. I _wanted_ to tell them but you had this fucking vision in your fucking head that it was going to go this particular way. You _told_ me it was going to be okay. You made me wait six months for my goddamn soulmates to reject me and then find someone else who isn’t even theirs!”

He’s so angry that he’s shaking. A very small part of him wonders if this is how Bruce feels before he becomes the Hulk but the rest of him is taken up with the fact that someone else is sharing Steve and Bucky’s bed, _someone else_ has taken his place in their lives and it could’ve all been avoided.

“I know,” Nat says in this small, defeated voice. It’s her guilty voice, not the one that she puts on when she’s on a mission, but the one that she uses when she knows she’s messed up, when she’s truly sorry.

Tony ignores it. This is his life that she played with. “Did you even tell them I was their date that night?” he asks.

She shakes her head. “I thought it would be more romantic if it was a surprise.”

He scoffs, running his hand through his hair. “’More romantic,’” he mutters. “No wonder they didn’t think it was a date.” He pours himself about two fingers of whiskey. It’s probably too early for him to be drinking but that’s the mental state he’s at right now.

“Tony,” Nat begins helplessly. She takes a deep breath. There’s a mirror over the kitchen sink. In it, Tony can see that her eyes are shining bright with unshed tears. “Tony, I’m _sorry_.”

He’s not ready to forgive her, not for a long time. But he needs her because Ophelia Sarkissian is claiming to be Steve and Bucky’s soulmate and she’s not. So he takes a deep breath of his own, downs his whiskey, and says, “I know.”

She asks hesitantly, “You’re not forgiving me?”

“No.”

She nods a bit to herself. “Good. I don’t deserve it.”

It’s the matter-of-fact way that she says it that has Tony giving her the tiniest of smiles. No, she doesn’t deserve it at the moment. But he knows her. He knows that she’ll make it up to him eventually. It might take a while, might take _years_ , but she’ll figure it out, the same way she figured out how to make up for the whole stabbing-him-in-the-neck thing.

“Come on, Natasha. We’ve got work to do.”

* * *

Steve and Bucky have a date with Ophelia “Call me Fee” Sarkissian the same night he comes back from India. He watches them closely when they get home to see if their behavior’s changed any. Steve’s hasn’t. He greets Tony with a huge smile and a cheerful, “Welcome back, Shellhead!”

Bucky, on the other hand…

Bucky glances at him once, grunts a hello, and then stalks past him into the kitchen. If it hadn’t been for the fact that his texts to Tony had been perfectly friendly all the way up until he’d met Sarkissian, Tony might have thought that he was angry at him for leaving for India. But they _had_ been friendly with each other and Bucky isn’t really one to bury his emotions, not now that he can express them after HYDRA’s fall. Tony watches him go with narrowed eyes.

* * *

It’s like that for the next couple of days. Tony tries to greet him or hug him or do any of the things that he’d done with Bucky beforehand and Bucky not only brushes him off, but completely ignores him.

They’ve got another date four days after Tony gets back. Tony’s in the living room on his tablet as they go by. He gives them a quick little wave. Steve flashes him a smile. Bucky-

Bucky stops dead in his tracks and stares at him, open mouthed. “Tony?” he asks. Tony, confused, starts to ask what’s going on but Steve’s hurrying him along, reminding him that they’re going to be late if they don’t go now, and Tony watches them disappear into the elevator.

As the doors are closing, he hears Bucky ask lowly, “When did Tony get back?”

He bolts upright and stares at the closed doors. He’s still there when Nat comes in and asks what’s going on. “Nothing,” he replies thoughtfully. “I hope.”

It’s like that for the next few weeks. Steve and Bucky go on their dates with Sarkissian and come back, Steve smiling and Bucky grim. A couple days pass and slowly, Bucky starts returning to his normal personality with everyone except Tony. Tony takes longer to warm up to and it always seems to surprise Bucky that Tony’s even around.

He’d suspect brainwashing but he just can’t figure out what Sarkissian’s goal is. The background check that JARVIS ran on her checked out. She genuinely does seem to be a simple schoolteacher (of course, that isn’t to say that schoolteachers can’t be supervillains but, in his experience, schoolteachers tend to go for more elaborate plans). He’s not entirely certain what to do, if he should be looking for someone else in addition to Sarkissian because she’s just being used or if she is actually the one behind it all. He’s not sure which thought he finds scarier.

* * *

He meets Sarkissian some three weeks after he gets back to the tower. There’s a mission in Pennsylvania and, as they always do, they go out for dinner afterwards. They’re walking down the street when Steve catches up to him and asks if he can invite Fee, as he calls her, along.

“It’s just that she lives nearby. You’re the only one who hasn’t met her yet and-”

“Sure,” Tony says, keeping his gaze fixed on the horizon so he doesn’t break down and confess everything (and maybe a little bit so that Steve doesn’t catch him in his lie). “Sounds like fun.”

He _does_ want to meet her. JARVIS’ background check can only go so far and he wants to get her measure himself without any sort of bias. What he ends up deciding is that there is definitely something going on between her and Bucky. She spends the meal sandwiched between the two supersoldiers. While she does pay a little bit of attention to Steve, it’s clear that most of her focus is on Bucky. The two giggle and murmur things quietly to each other, completely ignoring the outside world. Steve looks a bit embarrassed to be seen with them, but it’s that fond sort of embarrassment like how Rhodey looks whenever his parents are being cute with each other.

By the end of the meal, Bucky’s back to the sullen person Tony’s seen around the tower the last few weeks- unless he’s talking to Sarkissian. Tony files the incident away in his brain.

* * *

One week after that, Tony’s sound asleep when his bedroom door creaks open. He’s used to people coming and going during the night and so he only rouses a little bit. Someone climbs into the bed behind him. He’s convinced it’s Nat, especially when the person snuggles up behind him, but then they lay a heavy- too heavy to be Nat’s- arm across his waist.

He’s just getting ready to tell Bucky that he can’t keep sharing his bed, not when they’ve got Sarkissian waiting for them, when he realizes that Bucky’s shoulders are shaking. He’s making these soft, hitching breaths and Tony gets it suddenly- Bucky’s crying.

“I don’t know what’s going on,” Bucky whispers. “I think I’m losing- I’m-” He stops, shuddering his way through a sob. “Tony, honey, I’m scared. I don’t- I shouldn’t-” He pulls away entirely. Tony has to keep from keening at the loss of the warmth pressed along his back. “I shouldn’t be bothering you,” he murmurs and leaves the room.

The following morning, Steve and Bucky have a morning brunch with Sarkissian. When they get back, Bucky isn’t just grumpy with Tony but completely ignores his presence altogether.

* * *

“Something’s wrong,” he announces.

He’s got the rest of the team, plus Rhodey and Sharon and minus Steve and Bucky who are on yet another date with Sarkissian, gathered in one of the conference rooms. They rarely use these, preferring the console room for debriefs, but they are technically for Avenger use.

Sam and Clint exchange looks. “You know,” Clint begins awkwardly. “Just because you don’t like Fee doesn’t mean that something’s wrong.”

“Oh don’t be stupid, Clint. It doesn’t suit you,” Sharon snaps and thwacks him on the back of the head.

“I’m not being stupid!” Clint protests as he rubs his head. “Everyone knows that those three were going to get together and then Fee came along. He shouldn’t be jealous just because they found their soulmate and he doesn’t have one.”

Rhodey growls lowly. “Hang on. You being friends with Bucky doesn’t mean that you have to be rude to Tony.”

This time, Clint’s protest is, “I’m not being rude!” He looks at Nat. “You tell them.”

She shakes her head. “Rhodey’s got a point. Tony has the right to be upset; it was really abrupt.”

“You don’t really mean that. You’re just trying to get on Tony’s good side again.”

“And you’re just being an ass because Coop’s upset you missed his football game!”

The two spies break out into a squabble, interjected with comments from Sam and Rhodey. Tony, slightly dazed, leans over to Bruce. “What did he mean you knew we were going to get together?” he asks quietly. “They weren’t-”

Bruce grimaces. “They were actually. For Valentine’s. And then they didn’t. Next thing we knew, they were claiming they’ve got a third. We don’t know what happened.”

Tony’s mouth parts on a small gasp. “They were going to ask me out?” he clarifies.

Bruce nods and pats his arm. “We all thought it was inevitable. There was a betting pool and everything.”

He doesn’t get the chance to respond before Thor declares loudly, putting an end to the argument, “I believe that Tony was speaking of the changes in Bucky.”

The others fall silent. “Thanks, big guy,” Tony mutters. “I was. Talking about Bucky. I mean, doesn’t it seem weird that he’s this distant?”

“Relationships change people,” Sam points out but he’s shifting in his chair uneasily. “Just look at Taylor Swift.”

“This isn’t just wearing different clothes,” Sharon says. “Tony’s right. He doesn’t talk to any of us. He spends all his time on his floor-”

“He didn’t even realize I was back for three days,” Tony says. “And I wasn’t exactly hiding. I know it has to be awkward bringing your soulmate around someone you planned to- were they really going to ask me out?”

“Yeah,” Sam replies. “They had reservations at this restaurant and everything. They were really excited.”

He hesitates before continuing, “And why didn’t they?”

Sam glances down at his wrist. “They- um- they saw your mark.”

He can practically _hear_ the record screech.

“Your…mark?” Clint asks delicately.

Tony doesn’t blame him for sounding so surprised. He’s actively encouraged the thought that his soulmate is dead. But he doesn’t answer either. His brain is racing, putting puzzle pieces together. He hadn’t had all the pieces before, that’s why he’d been so confused but he can see it now. He’d thought back then that Steve and Bucky must have seen his mark and been disgusted by the thought of him as their soulmate. But they hadn’t seen it at all, not clearly anyway. They’d just seen that he had a mark and must have assumed that he was waiting for his soulmate. No wonder they hadn’t thought of him as a potential soulmate. They’d already been primed to think of him as someone with his own mark, his own soulmate.

“Ophelia Sarkissian isn’t Steve and Bucky’s soulmate,” he announces. He pulls off the SKIN and, for the first time in decades, bares his wrist on purpose. “Because I am.”

He doesn’t give them any time before he continues, “And that’s a problem. Because either someone is pulling the strings to get Sarkissian into place as their soulmate or Sarkissian herself is the puppet master, which means that she’s able to hack JARVIS. Either way, we’re under attack and we won’t be able to use either Captain America or the Winter Soldier for this one. So who’s got ideas?”

* * *

The plan they come up with is simple. They start with Tony uncovering his mark for good. Then they make sure that Sarkissian stays as far away from Steve and Bucky as possible. Once Bucky’s back to normal, they’ll start easing both Steve and Bucky into the idea that maybe, just maybe, Tony’s their soulmate.

It goes to hell almost immediately.

Tony stops wearing his SKIN but it doesn’t seem like either Steve or Bucky notice. In fact, Steve seems to actively be avoiding it. And, honestly, Tony’s not really trying too hard. He’s not entirely certain he even _wants_ them to notice. He doesn’t want Sarkissian to have any sort of leverage on them. But he isn’t really sure that he wants to become Steve and Bucky’s soulmate. He knows now that they were getting ready to ask him out. Sam tells him later that they’d been so, _so_ disappointed when they realized he had a soulmate.

It’s just- well, he doesn’t really appreciate them making that decision for him. They hadn’t just decided not to ask him out. They’d completely withdrawn from his life. He’d been left wondering what he’d done wrong and, as it turned out, he hadn’t done anything wrong, just had the misfortune of having a soulmark. There’d been the whole thing with dinner that night too. He’s sure now that it must have seemed like too much for them, to have him there like it was an actual date and not believing that it was real. He’s still angry with Nat for not giving them all of the information. They should never have gone into that situation blind, no matter how she’d pictured it in her head. But that still doesn’t excuse either of them for just blatantly assuming he was there platonically. And he knows that part of that’s on him. He could have spoken up. He didn’t have to let his own insecurities sway him from saying anything. But he dares anyone to have done better in that situation.

So, no, he’s not really trying too hard to get them to notice his mark.

The second part, with trying to get Sarkissian away from Steve and Bucky, is completely doomed to failure. He should have expected that Bucky wouldn’t be okay with them trying to keep them away from her. Bucky doesn’t really have much to do with the team anymore but he sometimes runs date ideas by Steve in the common room. They start there by reminding him each time he tries to set up a date that he’s got other more important engagements.

“You said you were going to Lila’s archery tournament,” Clint reminds him one morning.

“You’ve got a mission in Sweden,” Sharon comments idly two hours later.

“You wanted to go stargazing with Jane and myself,” Thor says at lunch.

“You’re supposed to be attending the Maria Stark Foundation gala,” Tony says that night.

It only works for two days before Bucky snarls, “I don’t know what your problem is with Fee but I don’t appreciate it. If you won’t let me go to her, then she can come here for movie night.”

“Nope,” Nat says immediately. “JARVIS hasn’t cleared her for tower entry.”

She still hasn’t earned his forgiveness but Tony feels himself warming up towards her- just a teeny tiny bit.

“Then clear her for tower entry,” Bucky snaps.

“No can do, Buckaroo,” Tony replies. “That takes time. She raised a flag on her security check. Probably nothing more serious than a parking ticket but you know how it is.” He waves an airy hand.

He didn’t know Bucky could even growl that lowly.

“I want to see my soulmate!” _And I’m right here,_ Tony thinks but he keeps his mouth firmly closed. Bucky looks between the two of them. “Do I have plans for tonight?”

Neither of them can think of anything before Bucky completely steamrolls over them and says, “Great! I’m going to Fee’s house. Don’t expect me back until tomorrow.”

He stalks out of the room. “He didn’t say anything about Steve,” Nat says after a moment.

“No,” Tony says slowly. “He didn’t.”

* * *

Bruce is at a conference in Atlanta. Thor’s in New Mexico with Jane and her team. Sharon, Clint, and Nat are on a mission in some undisclosed location (Siberia but Tony’s not going to tell them that he knows that). Rhodey’s doing something for the Air Force in another undisclosed location (Oman but Tony’s not going to tell _him_ that he knows that). Steve and Bucky are out on a run. Sam went with them because “someone needs to be with them” which was decided after they realized that Plan A wasn’t going to work.

The point is, Tony’s alone in his workshop when the power goes out.

There’s a soft whirring sound before the backup generators kick in. A beat- two- and then the backup generators fail too. Tony’s plunged into darkness. If he listens hard, he can just barely hear the sounds of the alarms in R&D, working only because they’re connected to their own power grid. He knows that eventually the arc reactor in the Hudson will kick in and run the building’s power but JARVIS is the first line of defense. If the tower goes into a blackout, it’s because they got to JARVIS first.

“J?” he calls quietly.

“Sir- sor- I- ther- Si- _intruder_ ,” JARVIS manages to stutter out before he too goes silent.

Tony goes completely cold. There are very, _very_ few people who could ever cause JARVIS to fail like that and all of them would need to be in the building to cause a full blackout. He runs through his options. He could call for help but anyone who could hack JARVIS could be listening in on the phones. He could use the suit but he’s pretty sure that he’ll need stealth for this. He could possibly wait for Steve, Bucky, and Sam to come back but he doesn’t know if the doors will even open. More to the point, he’s not entirely sure if Steve and Bucky will even help.

In the end, he snatches up the wrist gauntlet he’s been working on and makes his way toward the door. It’s quiet. At this time of morning, no one’s in yet except- he checks his watch to make sure- the night shift. He knows what’s in their protocol; he helped write it after all. They’ll know to call the police and to get outside if they can. They won’t know at all that the intruder’s in the server room.

God he hopes they’re still alive.

The elevators aren’t working so he takes the stairs. _If this was a movie_ , he thinks _, there’d be red lights flashing_. But it’s not a movie and even the backup generators aren’t working so it’s just dark. He’s both grateful and ungrateful for the arc reactor still in his chest. Grateful because it provides just enough light to keep him from tripping on the stairs and ungrateful because he’s pretty sure it’ll give him away once he reaches the server room.

The servers are stored on a hidden floor another two stories below his basement workshop. They’re not on any plans of the building and surrounded by nearly two hundred yards of solid concrete. They’re impossible to break into from the outside. Five stories above them is another server room, completely false and listed on all the plans as the actual server room. Only three people in the world know of the existence of the real server room- Happy, Pepper, and Tony himself- none of whom would ever spill its secret. No one should have enough knowledge to bring down the servers.

Someone’s been casing his building. Someone’s been in and out enough times to know that the servers on the second floor are a fake. Someone knew to take out JARVIS.

And Tony thinks he knows who.

The doors to the server room run on the same power grid as the alarms in R&D. Should someone break in and crash the servers, the doors lock. Tony made them from the same vibranium alloy in the arc reactor. They’re unbreakable. Tony and Pepper are the only two people with the code to the doors.

 _At least something’s going right_ , he thinks when he sees that the doors are still intact. He types in the code. The doors open with the softest of hisses. It’s still too loud to him and he makes a note to fix that.

It doesn’t matter. His intruder is waiting for him, sitting on a briefcase not five feet from the entrance, tapping her fingers on her knees.

“It took you five minutes longer than it should have to get here,” Ophelia Sarkissian says, sounding remarkably bored. She’s dropped her American accent, replaced with something more guttural. Eastern European, maybe?

“My apologies,” Tony says. “It was dark.”

“No matter. You’re here now.” She’s examining her hand now like she’s looking to see if she broke a nail while she was tapping them. “My Soldier came to me two days ago, alone, without that pathetic captain of his, and when I activated him, do you know what he told me?”

“No but I think you’re gonna tell me.”

She stands. Tony immediately activates the gauntlet, letting it warm up. He can’t risk firing it in here, not when he might run the risk of damaging JARVIS, but she doesn’t know that.

“He told me that I can’t be his soulmate because he already knows who he is.”

Tony isn’t sure that he knows where this is going. Bucky doesn’t know who he is. He can’t because surely he would have said something rather than let Steve go through this whole dating mess. He lets her talk though as she takes a step forward and he takes a step back. He needs her out of the room, away from JARVIS, so he can use the repulsor.

“He didn’t know his name, of course. HYDRA didn’t let him remember silly things like _names_. But he could draw him for me.”

She takes another step forward. Tony moves back. He estimates he’ll need her to move another two steps before she’ll be out of the room entirely. It’s a risk, he knows. If he lets her into the corridor, she could possibly escape to the stairs. He could lose her. But he’s far less willing to lose JARVIS.

“Do you know who he drew?” she asks. He doesn’t know but he can guess.

“I didn’t know either at first,” Sarkissian says, disregarding that Tony hadn’t actually replied. Another step forward. Another step back. “But then I remembered that Howard and Maria Stark weren’t supposed to be the only ones killed on December 16, 1991. Do you know now?”

He does. He remembers the morning after. He’d been too distraught to care about the unlocked window at the time but he’d looked back on it after Afghanistan. Stane had been the last person to leave the house that night and Tony had been unable to help but wonder if that had been his first attempt on Tony’s life.

“He drew you. A much younger you, yes, but still you. And you see that creates a problem because I can’t have you around to get in my way. I intend to reclaim my Soldier. So tell me, Anthony Stark, are you the Winter Soldier’s soulmate?”

 _Just one more step_. “What makes you think I’ll tell you?”

Sarkissian smiles, cold and deadly as a viper. “You won’t,” she agrees. “Fortunately, I don’t need you to tell me.”

A flash of silver in the light of the reactor- a hiss of steel in the air- the whisper of fabric falling to the ground- and the sleeve on his shirt falls to the ground as the sword that he’d missed in the dark is lowered to Sarkissian’s side.

“The phoenix and her flame,” she murmurs, gaze transfixed on the mark on his wrist. As though drawn to it, she takes one more step forward-

-and Tony fires-

-and misses-

Sarkissian drops to the floor and the blast slams into the door, knocking it askew. She hisses as she slowly turns her head to look at the damage. “You could have killed me,” she shrieks.

“That was the goal, yep,” Tony mutters, more distracted by the gauntlet smoking. It’s still in its early developmental stages; it’s only got two or three uses out of it. He’d been counting on that first blast taking her out.

She launches herself at him and Tony- Tony scrambles backward. He can’t beat Nat even when she’s going easy on him. Sarkissian is every bit as good as Nat is without the hindrance of trying to keep him relatively undamaged.

“It’s a shame I need you alive,” she snaps as she feints to his right shoulder. Tony sees it for what it is and dodges accordingly. “Have to keep my Soldier compliant somehow.”

Somehow- and Tony has no idea how- she gets in close and rakes her nails across his face. There’s a slight sting from one of the marks. At first, he thinks that it’s just because she drew blood but then she says, “Fortunately, there’s nothing that says I need you uninjured.”

The sting turns into a burn and then it spreads and then Tony’s swaying, suddenly dizzy. He doesn’t think that he was facing two Sarkissians but that’s how many he’s seeing. No- wait- three. That can’t be right.

“Wha-?” he begins before his back hits the wall and he starts to slump.

The three Sarkissians lean in. “Hail HYDRA,” they hiss as one.


	7. Feel It Burn When You're Knocked Down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Steve realizes that things are very wrong, the Winter Soldier is activated, and things get worse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd say I'm sorry for taking such a long break from this story but I'm not. This past semester has been very difficult and stressful and I needed to focus on stories that didn't have the same high stakes that this one did. I am sorry that I left you guys with a cliffhanger (and even sorrier that I'll be leaving you with another one).
> 
> Some content WARNINGS for this chapter: what I consider to be nongraphic depictions of violence but might be considered graphic by someone else, dubious consent regarding the activation of the Winter Soldier
> 
> If you're worried about the chapter warnings, please check the endnotes where I've provided a more in-depth summary of the content warnings. Be safe, darlings, above all else.
> 
> Also, you might have noticed that the chapter count has gone up. Don't worry, the last chapter is just a brief epilogue.
> 
> Lastly, I can't believe I need to add this disclaimer but recent comments have made me reconsider: I do not accept concrit. I do not accept negative comments. I ESPECIALLY do not accept negative comments masquerading as thinly veiled concrit. If you have a negative opinion about something that I've written--that isn't asking me to tag something better--then that's fine but please keep it to yourself. You aren't required to read anything that I've written and I don't enjoy getting the little email notification about a comment only to realize that it's someone complaining about something that I worked very hard on. Thank you for your consideration.

Look, Steve knows he fucked up.

He knows that he hasn’t done right by this new century, that he’s been overwhelmed and adapting poorly and unwilling to reach out for help because Captain America’s supposed to be better than that. He hasn’t done right by Bucky, too excited to have him back that he’d never stopped to think about how Bucky wasn’t the same person he once was. He’s messed up their relationship, so hurt by the revelation of Tony’s soulmark that he pushed to move on without waiting to get over his feelings. He’d known that Bucky hadn’t been ready for another relationship, had barely even been ready to renew _their_ relationship, but he hadn’t even considered Bucky’s feelings, just been too caught up in his own.

But worst of all is how he’s treated Tony.

God but he just can’t seem to do right by Tony. He fucked up the Avengers the first time and he called Tony selfish, all but accused him of still being the Merchant of Death. He didn’t go back to New York after SHIELD fell. He still doesn’t know why it had been so important to Tony that he not go to Missouri but it had been and he let him down. He told him about Bucky killing his parents. Sure, it’s better than if he’d never told him at all but Tony had still been so hurt by the revelation. He’d rubbed his relationship with Bucky in Tony’s face, flaunted their soulmate status when Tony had been rejected by his. And now this whole mess with Ophelia.

Actually, Ophelia might be the worst.

Steve’s not stupid. He knows he’s done some pretty stupid things over the last couple of years but he’s not actually an idiot. He knows that something is off about her. It had been hard not to know. He hadn’t felt the instantaneous attraction that Bucky had felt towards her and it was impossible to miss the way Bucky acted after each of their dates, the way he’d been distant with everyone but especially with Tony. And then there’d been the days when everything would be fine but Bucky would act like he couldn’t remember what had happened the days prior to that. Then they’d go on another date with Ophelia and the cycle would start all over again.

He’s sure that it’s something that she’s actually doing to him but he can’t figure out what. He doesn’t leave her and Bucky alone during their dates so she doesn’t have the _time_ to do anything to Bucky and her dresses don’t have pockets so it’s not like she can be hiding something in her clothes. She smiles through their dates seemingly innocently, even if she does seem to pay more attention to Bucky than to Steve.

At first, he’d thought he was just jealous _because_ she was visibly more attracted to Bucky than him. He’d thought she was just reminding him of how it would feel when he and Bucky used to go out and everyone they met would skip over him entirely. But that isn’t it at all. Something is wrong. He _knows_ that something is wrong.

But he keeps coming back to the mark.

There are no public records of their mark, no photographs, no video footage. Bucky wears long sleeves and Steve wears a band around his wrist. No one should know what their mark looks like, no one but their other soulmate. But Ophelia does. She knows and it doesn’t make sense because that should mean that she’s their other soulmate but she just feels _wrong._

He’d thought maybe that she’s actually HYDRA. But Natasha _and_ JARVIS had vetted her. They’d said she was clean. Maybe they could have missed something but Natasha is the world’s best spy and JARVIS is an advanced AI. How could Ophelia have flown beneath their radar?

Looking back on it, he knows that he should have gone to someone else with his suspicions. But he’d been so worried that they wouldn’t believe him. That they would look at him and ask if he wasn’t just confused because of Tony or worse—that they would accuse him of trying to have the best of both worlds. He was the one to get him and Bucky into this situation. He should be the one to get them back out of it.

Steve knows he’s fucked up, knows that Bucky is paying the price for his mistake.

But it doesn’t quite hit him just how badly he’s fucked up until he comes back to find the Tower dark.

The Tower runs on self-sustaining energy, powered by an arc reactor submerged in the Hudson. Tony had told them back when they’d first moved into the Tower, when Clint had still been shaken from Loki’s scepter, that there were only two ways to bring it down: either by destroying the reactor in the Hudson (a nigh on impossible task) or by breaking into the server room. When Natasha had pointed out that everyone with access to the building’s plans knew where the server room was, Tony had given her a darkly amused glance and said, “Are you willing to stake your attack based off of that?”

But the Tower is dark now. Steve knows that no one destroyed the reactor because that would take a force strong enough to level the city—which means that someone broke into the Tower and brought it down from the inside. It’s early in the morning, early enough that none of the daytime employees are there yet. There are no guests staying in the Tower and all of the Avengers are out for various reasons.

 _No_ , Steve realizes, his body going cold. _All but one_. He stares at the darkened Tower in horror.

Tony’s still in there.

“Tony!” Sam gasps, setting off at a dead sprint for their private entrance. Steve is hot on his heels. The doors are locked, the card reader not responding to the IDs Tony had issued so long ago.

“JARVIS is offline,” Sam mutters, phone to his ear.

“Put out an alert,” Steve orders him. “Call everyone back.” He runs back around to the front entrance. The night staff are crowded around the doors, frantically banging on the glass. It won’t work. The Tower doors are designed to be shatterproof. _Well_ , he thinks grimly _, let’s see if they’re supersoldier-proof._

“Get back!” he roars. The employees don’t seem to hear him but they get the hint as soon as he starts backing up for a running start. He slams into the door with all the force he can muster. A crack spiders out from where his shoulder rams into the glass, traversing the length of the door before it splinters into a thousand other cracks and finally shatters.

He rushes inside before anyone else can escape. His first thought is probably supposed to be the employees and getting them out safely but it’s not. He leaves that job to Sam. His mind is entirely fixed on Tony.

The Tower is eerily silent—no JARVIS welcoming him home, no Tony coming over the loudspeakers to urge him down to the workshop. He’s never noticed the near-silent mechanical hum of the building before but now that it’s gone, he doesn’t know how he ever missed it. The elevators are down so he takes the stairs four a time, racing first down to the basement workshop. The lab is empty, devoid of Tony’s presence. Steve’s eye catches on the main workbench. There’s a series of wires and tools left out like Tony had been working on something before he left. Automatically, Steve glances at the Iron Man armors on display—one of them is missing a gauntlet. Good; Tony had protection when he left.

He runs back up to the team’s floors. Tony isn’t on any of them and neither is he in any of the conference rooms. Steve hadn’t really expected him to be. If someone is attacking the Tower, especially like this with everyone else gone, they’re after Tony. And while Tony isn’t a bad fighter, a decent villain is more than a match for Tony out of the suit.

When he gets back to the lobby, the police are there talking to Sam—and to Bucky, Steve realizes with a shock. Bucky, who hadn’t so much as picked up the pace when they first came across the darkened Tower, who hadn’t seemed worried for Tony, who hadn’t done anything but hang back. Steve studies him now before anyone else realizes he’s there. Bucky still seems shockingly unconcerned about the attack, not like he might have planned it but more along the lines of it simply not bothering him.

He thinks about saying something but storm clouds are gathering overhead, fast enough to be something more than a thunderstorm, fast enough to—a bolt of rainbow light arcs down, impacting the ground with a shudder that rattles the windows. A moment later, Thor is there, striding out of the bridge, clad in full armor.

“What has happened?” he calls.

“Tony’s gone,” Steve says quietly. No one’s eyes are on him. Thunder is still rumbling. There should be no reason that anyone could have heard him. Yet somehow, his words draw the attention of everyone in the room.

Sam says, “Rhodey said he’s not answering his phone.”

Steve holds up the phone he found in the workshop. “It’s here.” This, more than anything, convinces him that Tony’s been taken. Tony doesn’t go anywhere without his phone. He certainly wouldn’t have left it behind if he had left voluntarily.

* * *

The team is standing behind Rhodes in the no longer secret server room. They’d come down a few minutes ago to find the door wide open and a lone Iron Man gauntlet on the ground. “They must have gotten to JARVIS through here,” Pepper had said, holding her hand to her mouth. Her eyes had been wide and fearful.

“Tony would have come down here,” Rhodes had continued. “JARVIS is his child. No way would he have let an attack on JARVIS stand.”

There had been the question of how the kidnapper had gotten Tony out of the building, answered quickly when they’d spotted the hole drilled through the floor and the attached tunnel.

“They must have been working for weeks,” Natasha had said. She had been video calling along with Clint and Sharon, their Quinjet still en route from their mission. Sam had gone down into the tunnel, following it nearly a mile before reporting that it ended in an alleyway.

“Easy to miss from the road,” he’d said. “They could have easily parked a van back here and driven off with him.”

Pepper had choked back a sob.

Rhodes is seated on the floor, a laptop perched on his knees. His hands are flying over the keyboard. “What are you doing?” Thor asks curiously.

“Bringing JARVIS back online,” Rhodes says shortly.

“You can do that?” Sam asks.

Rhodes spares the quickest of glares for him before he’s looking back down at the keyboard. “You know, Tony’s not the only one who went to MIT. It’s where we met.”

“He trusts you with JARVIS’ code,” Steve states.

Rhodes snorts. “I helped _build_ JARVIS’ code. He’s a learning AI so most of his code is actually things he’s picked up over the years but his base code is still mostly Tony’s—and a little bit of me, which you should be very thankful for because we need him.”

The answer should be obvious and Steve is pretty sure that it is but he still asks. “Why?”

“Because whoever took Tony didn’t attack the servers. If they had, the arc reactor would have kicked in by now. No, they attacked JARVIS.”

“Isn’t that bad?” Clint asks.

“Of course it is,” Rhodes snaps. “Anyone who can hack JARVIS is pretty fucking powerful. But JARVIS has a subroutine. If he’s under attack and he doesn’t think he can defeat them, he has a command sequence to divert from the attack to look into the attacker themselves so that the last thing that he would send out before shutting down is the name of his attacker.”

“So then whoever took Tony didn’t succeed in shutting down JARVIS,” Natasha says. For a moment, Steve feels irrationally angry at the AI. How dare JARVIS give up when Tony was in danger? Didn’t he have more care for his creator?

Then Rhodes says, “They might as well have. JARVIS has only done this once that I know of: with Stane and that’s because Stane had the shutdown sequence. He didn’t need to attack. JARVIS has never actually lost a fight before.”

He shakes his head, as though to clear it. “I’ve almost got it. I haven’t seen this code in over twenty years. It’s taking me a while.”

“You’re doing fine, Jim,” Pepper whispers though her voice is tight and her eyes are worried.

“Yeah but Tony could be doing _better_ ,” Rhodes says frustratedly.

Something in Pepper’s face goes soft and she places a steadying hand on Rhodes’ shoulder. “It’s not like Afghanistan,” she murmurs. “We’re looking for him _now_ , not several hours later.”

Rhodes takes a deep, steadying breath. “ _Fuck_ ,” he mutters empathically. Steve knows exactly how he feels. He types in a few more keystrokes. Something on the computer flashes green and then the Tower whirrs back to life, lights coming back to life, the hum of the building a reassuring constant in the back of Steve’s mind.

“Welcome—” JARVIS begins and then stops. “I cannot find Sir.” The statement is worried, plaintive almost, the fearful words of a child who’s lost their parent. Steve doesn’t think he’s ever thought about how much life Tony instills into his creations but it’s impossible to miss now.

“We’ll find him,” Sharon promises.

“JARVIS?” Rhodes asks. “Who was in your servers last?”

A long pause, uncharacteristic for the world’s greatest AI. Then, “Ophelia Sarkissian.”

There’s a beat as the team takes in the information and then the room dissolves into chaos. Natasha is screaming through the phone that this is Steve’s fault. Pepper is having a furious discussion with Rhodes about how she could have bypassed the Tower’s security, never mind the giant hole in the floor because surely the drilling should have alerted _something_. Sam and Clint are both loudly denying that it could possibly be Fee because how could they have missed something this big?

And Steve is curled in on himself, choking out desperate sobs. Oh god, this is all his fault. He pushed to find their third. He accepted that she was their soulmate without digging deeper. He didn’t say anything about his fears that something was wrong. He didn’t tell anyone about how suspicious it was that Fee never paid attention to him, that she lavished everything on Bucky, that Bucky would come home a shell of himself. He did this—to Bucky, to the team, to _Tony_.

In fact, the only one who doesn’t seem to be concerned at all is Bucky, which is steadily growing more suspicious by the second. It’s starting to draw the attention of the others. “Barnes,” Rhodes growls. “Is there something you want to say?”

“It’s not Fee,” Bucky says.

The team gapes at him. “Bucky—” Natasha begins.

“It’s not Fee!” Bucky insists. The words are stubborn, firm, but there’s something in his eyes—something panicked almost. “It’s not Fee,” he says again, starting to rock a little on his heels, his voice starting to pick up in pitch. “It’s not Fee, it’s not Fee, it’s not Feeitsnotfeeitsnotfeeitsnotfeeitsnotfeeitsnotfee—”

“Enough!” Sam shouts. Bucky stops his chant but he’s still rocking back and forth. He turns his wild gaze on Sam. Almost reflexively, Sam takes a step back. Steve doesn’t blame him. Bucky looks insane, obsessed and crazed with his need to protect Ophelia.

Rhodes doesn’t seem to share the same fear, whether that courage is born from the missing Tony though, Steve couldn’t say. He moves toward Bucky, growling lowly. “It _is_ your fucking girlfriend. JARVIS can’t lie about this.”

Slowly, Bucky turns to him. He inhales deeply then screams, “It’s not Fee!” and launches himself, snarling, at Rhodes.

“No!” Steve shouts, throwing himself at Bucky to hold him back. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Thor grabbing Rhodes but he’s busy trying to hold onto Bucky, who’s writhing in his grip, trying to break free. Bucky is still shouting his conviction, eyes becoming crazier with each passing moment. “Sam, help me!”

Sam grabs onto Bucky’s other arm. Together, they’re able to pull him away, out of the server room, where Bucky immediately stops struggling though he continues chanting brokenly.

“We have to lock him up,” Sam pants. “He’s a danger to everyone like this.”

“But there’s something wrong with him!” Steve protests. “We should—”

“Steve.” Sam sighs. “We can either try to fix Bucky or we can find Tony. You can’t have both.”

Steve stares at him for a long time. Between them, Bucky is still muttering about how it couldn’t have been Ophelia. Steve wants to believe him. He doesn’t want to think that his soulmate could have done something so horrible. But she did and Steve had kept his growing suspicions to himself and now Tony is gone.

“Tony. We find Tony.”

* * *

They lock Bucky in the containment room for the Hulk. Then they wait for Natasha to get there, both because she’s the only Avenger trained in interrogations and because she’s the only one who came to them from a rival agency.

Natasha stares at Bucky for a long time, arms crossed, before she turns and walks back out of the room. Steve, Sam, and Clint are gathered in one of the living rooms, watching the footage on the TV.

“The good news,” Natasha says as she enters the room, “is that Bucky can probably tell me what Sarkissian did to him and where she might have taken Tony.”

“That’s great!” Steve begins but Rhodes shakes his head.

“What’s the bad news?” he asks.

Natasha sighs and looks at Clint. “I used to see it in the Red Room,” she says, sinking down onto one of the armchairs. There’s a dawning light of understanding in Clint’s expression. “Many of us were proud to serve. Some of us were not. For those, our handlers would try other techniques: brainwashing, trigger words.” She pauses, a rare sorrowful look in her eyes. “Torture, sometimes. I see that in Bucky.”

“Which?” Steve asks, not sure he wants to know but certain that he _needs_ to.

“You already know they tortured and brainwashed him,” Clint says quietly.

“But I see signs of the use of trigger words too,” Natasha finishes.

“Trigger words?” Sam asks.

“It would have been a series of them,” Clint says. “Under the right conditions, they can make an operative completely susceptible to commands.”

Steve exchanges a worried glance with Sam. “Conditions?”

“The right words said in the right language in the right order,” Clint explains.

“Probably Russian,” Natasha suggests. “Based on where he fell and where he was seen most often, he would have most likely been held in Russia. They wouldn’t have wanted too common a language so English wouldn’t have worked. And they wouldn’t have wanted too rare a language in case a handler didn’t speak it so none of the regional languages either.”

“But Fee—” Steve begins before correcting himself. “—Sarkissian never spoke in Russian. She never even gave any sort of commands.”

“She wouldn’t have had to,” Natasha said.

“The right conditions,” Rhodes murmurs.

Natasha nods approvingly. “Only the right conditions could have put an agent fully under but even the wrong conditions can make them suggestible. Bucky still would have needed her to hint at what she wanted him to do but it wouldn’t have been the same as a full command. The words could have been spoken in English; she might have sprinkled them throughout conversation, anything like that.” She leans forward, propping her elbows up on her knees. “Steve, you’re the only one who might have any clue what those words might have been. They would have been said in order, maybe a mix of common and unusual words to keep you from becoming suspicious.”

So Steve thinks back to their dates with Ophelia. There’d been a lot said. Ophelia had liked to talk. Now that Steve knows she was probably trying to cover up Bucky’s trigger words, it makes sense in a twisted sort of way. It’s not the easiest, especially since he’s got a perfect memory. It’s just they’ve been on so many dates over the last few months—one every couple of days actually, he realizes.

Right when Bucky had started to seem normal again.

And now that he’s looking for it, he can see all the little things that had thrown him off about Ophelia and how they add up to the picture of—

“Wait,” he says. “Why would she even know Bucky’s trigger words. They must have come from HYDRA but—” The answer occurs to him even as Natasha and Clint give him identical sympathetic looks. “No,” he says. “She can’t be HYDRA. She’s a schoolteacher from Pennsylvania—”

“—who kidnapped my cousin,” Sharon finishes, entering the room. “Rhodey’s finished decoding the footage from the tower’s cameras. Sarkissian _is_ HYDRA.”

Steve sits back on the couch, stunned by the revelation. “This is my fault,” he murmurs. Sam starts to open his mouth but Steve shakes his head. “No, I did this. I thought something was wrong weeks ago. I should have said something. But I kept it to myself.”

“Why would you do that?” Sharon snaps. “We could have stopped this!”

“Because _I_ was the one who pushed to find our soulmate!” Steve cries, dropping his head into his hands. “I was the one who thought we should try to get over Tony with someone else and it wasn’t fair to anyone but I was too hurt to see it!”

“Too hurt?” Sharon snarls. “Or too proud? Look at this, Steve! HYDRA tried to get to Bucky, they _did_ get to Tony, and you didn’t say anything because you were too busy blaming yourself to do anything about it!”

“I thought I was imagining it,” Steve says.

Natasha laughs hysterically. “But you didn’t even think to _ask_. Either we’re a team or we’re not but you can’t keep these things to yourself. You wanted to tell Tony immediately about his parents but you couldn’t tell us that you thought your soulmate might be a bad guy? Fuck, I’ve been sitting here blaming myself for telling Tony to wait but you—you stayed quiet about this—”

“I KNOW!” Steve shouts. He’s not sure when he got to his feet but he’s there now. “I know this is my fault! I know I should have said something! I know that Tony’s missing and I could have stopped it and do you really think I’m not fucking beating myself up about it? Do you? Because I can’t stop thinking about it. I hurt Tony and Bucky and I put them both in the hands of HYDRA and I know all of that so can you all _shut up_ so I can try and fix this?”

The team seems stunned silent, shocked by his harsh words.

“Steve,” Clint starts to say. Steve just holds up a hand to stop him.

“Let me get these fucking trigger words out and then you can yell at me,” he says waspishly.

* * *

“Longing,” Steve begins slowly, still sifting through memories. “Rusted. Daybreak, maybe. Furnace. Benign. Homecoming. Freight car.”

Natasha frowns. “You’re certain?”

“There are lots of words she repeated but those were unusual and always in that order.”

“There’s only seven,” Natasha murmurs. “Trigger phrases usually have ten words.”

Steve thinks back again. “Maybe _seventeen_? It would’ve been between _rusted_ and _daybreak._ ”

As Natasha stands, she says to Sharon, “See if Rhodey can pull up the CCTV footage from some of their dates for the other two. I don’t think HYDRA would have only used eight words but I’ll try it anyway.”

The two women leave together, muttering something about the third soulmate. Steve, Sam, and Clint sit in silence for a few minutes.

“Steve,” Sam begins awkwardly. “We don’t all blame you.”

“Why not?” he asks ruefully. “I do.”

Clint huffs out a short bark of a laugh. “That’s kind of self-centered of you, isn’t it? We all met her. Any one of us could have said something but none of us did. And it’s not like we couldn’t have stopped you guys from meeting her. Tony could have said something years ago, I could have told you who your date was that night, Nat didn’t have to stop Tony from telling you…”

Slowly, Clint’s words filter through to Steve’s mind. “Tell me what?” he asks, turning to look at him.

Uncharacteristically, Clint looks very hesitant. “I…don’t think I should have said something. Sorry, I misspoke.”

Sam, however, quietly says, “You really didn’t see Tony’s mark?”

Steve shakes his head in answer. “Why is that important?”

Sam is wearing a conflicted expression. He starts to say something and then stops right as Natasha comes into view on screen in front of Bucky’s ~~cage~~ room. “Clint’s right,” Sam mutters. “It’s not our place.”

Steve wants to argue but Natasha is saying something in Russian—Bucky’s trigger words, he assumes—so he sits back and watches.

* * *

The words don’t work.

Bucky has a reaction to the first couple of words but then Natasha must miss one because he quiets back down. Natasha leaves again and comes back to the living room, looking more worried by the minute. The entire team, including Bruce and Thor, are there.

“I’m working on going through the footage,” Rhodes tells them, sounding frustrated and tired all at once. “But it’ll take time. Even JARVIS can only work so fast.”

Clint stands and heads for the door. “I’ve got a few contacts in the city. I’ll put a bug in their ear, see if anyone’s heard anything.”

Natasha goes with him, saying, “I’ll reach out to some of my contacts overseas. There’s a few ex-SHIELD agents in Russia. They might know if HYDRA’s on the move.”

A few minutes later, Pepper stands. She drops a quick kiss on Rhodes’ head and murmurs, “Tony made a few new friends when he was in India. He sounded very impressed with their tech.” Rhodes looks confused for a moment but then his expression clears.

“Only Tony,” he says with a chuckle that sounds more sad than amused.

“Only Tony,” Pepper agrees. “I’ll call them. They might be willing to help.”

“I will walk you out,” Thor offers. “I need to return to Asgard. Heimdall might have seen where Tony was taken.” Bruce leaves with them, presumably to reach out to his own contacts.

Rhodes works in silence for a few minutes before he passes tablets to Sam and Steve. “You two might as well make yourselves useful and help me find the last two trigger words.”

They spend several hours combing through the footage. Pepper comes back at some point and curls up with a tablet of her own. She’s there for about two hours before she has to leave for a board meeting. Rhodes gives her a worried look when she stands but she seems to read his mind and assures him that she won’t tell the board that Tony’s been kidnapped. Rhodes nods, seemingly reassured, and falls back to his task.

Silence falls again.

* * *

Clint comes back at some point. He listens to the footage for less than twenty minutes before he says, “ _Nine_ between _furnace_ and _benign_. _One_ after _homecoming_.”

“How did you even hear that?” Sam asks, audibly amazed. “We’ve been listening for hours.”

Clint gives them a casual shrug but there’s tension in the lines of his arms and a deep furrow between his brows. He’s clearly worried by Tony’s kidnapping. Steve doesn’t blame him. It’s the first kidnapping anyone on the team has experienced since they became a team and it’s _Tony_. No one would say it but Tony’s the heart of the team, the one who organizes team dinners and brings snacks to meetings, the one who lets his teammates share his bed when they have a bad night and fixes their gear. There’s a gaping hole in the team every single time Tony leaves for a business trip. It’s only worse now when he’s completely missing.

“She emphasizes those words,” Clint says. “Rewind the footage. I’ll show you.” They do but neither Steve, Sam, or Rhodes can pick out the emphasis on the two words. “I don’t know what to tell you. You pick these things up after twenty years with SHIELD.”

“I believe you,” Steve assures him. They didn’t have the luxury of _not_ believing him. Steve remembers reading once that every minute counts with a kidnapping and Tony’s been gone for—he checks the clock—over twenty-four hours.

They wait for Natasha to come back. While they do, Pepper and Bruce return, taking their own spots on the sofas. Natasha walks in some five minutes later, finishing a conversation on the phone.

“We think we’ve got the last two words,” Steve tells her. “Longing, rusted, seventeen, daybreak, furnace, nine, benign, homecoming, one, freight car.”

Natasha nods stoically. “I’ll see what we can get out of Bucky.”

As she starts to leave, Clint abruptly says, “Wait!”

She pauses in the doorway. “Clint,” she begins, “we don’t have the time—”

“Are you sure about this?”

Natasha quirks a brow at him.

“Nat, you know better than anyone else here what these trigger words can do to someone. You’ll be forcing him to relive some of the worst times of his life. Are you sure you want to do this to Bucky?”

Reluctant hesitation is written across Natasha’s face. “I—” she starts to say slowly but Steve stops her.

“It’s okay,” he says quietly. Everyone turns to look at him. He nods reassuringly at Natasha. “It’s okay. We—” He stops, thinking about how hurt Bucky will feel when he finds out they’ve betrayed him like this. But Tony is _missing_. They don’t know where he is or if he’s dead or hurt. It comes down to Tony or Bucky.

It always comes down to those two.

He tries again. “Tony’s been taken. The only person who might have any knowledge about where Ophelia’s taken him is Bucky. Now, we _could_ wait, see if any of your contacts come back with information, but it might be too late. _We_ might be too late. Bucky’s our best bet. Trust me, I want to use him as little as the rest of you do but we’re out of options. He won’t be able to tell us unless we use those words.”

“Cap,” Sam said lowly. “He might not want—”

“If it’s for Tony, he will,” Steve says firmly. He has to believe that because if he doesn’t, he thinks he’ll shatter apart just with the thought of what they’re going to do to his soulmate. He gives Natasha a single nod.

“Do it.”

* * *

The team watches with baited breath as Natasha enters the containment room. Bucky keeps his eyes trained on her from the other side of the glass, tracking her every movement. As she doesn’t immediately say anything though, he starts to relax—and that’s when Natasha begins.

“желание,” she says, taking another step closer. “ржавые.”

Bucky’s head snaps up.

“Семнадцать.”

“Don’t do this,” he pleads.

“рассвет.”

“Tasha, _please_.”

“печь.”

Bucky slams his metal fist against the glass. But the glass was made to withstand something much stronger than the Winter Soldier. It holds.

“девять.”

Something is stiffening Bucky’s limbs, holding him still even as his eyes scream to run.

“доброкачественный.”

“Please,” Bucky whispers.

“Возвращение домой.”

And then a broken plea, so quiet that Steve is the only one to hear it: “ _Stevie._ ”

“Один.”

Steve turns away.

“Грузовой вагон.” Natasha’s voice breaks, wavering on the last syllable. But it’s too late. The light is fading from Bucky’s eyes as he straightens, tucking his hands behind his back.

“солдат?” Natasha asks.

“Готовы подчиниться,” comes the flat response.

She shakes her head quickly. “Stand down,” she says in English.

He doesn’t.

“I have questions,” Nat continues. She looks visibly rattled. Steve can’t help but wonder if she had been like Bucky. If she had had her own trigger words.

If this had been Bucky, he would have quipped back with something snarky like, “I have answers.” It isn’t Bucky though and the Soldier just stands silently.

Natasha seems to be waiting for a response but she grasps quickly enough that there isn’t one coming. Eventually, she just asks, “What did Ophelia Sarkissian tell you?”

To Steve’s surprise, the Soldier begins to list back everything Ophelia had ever said to them, beginning with their very first date. He hadn’t known Bucky had such a good memory. The realization that there’s something about Bucky that he doesn’t know shakes him more than a little and he looks at the rest of the team to see if they’re just as affected as he is. The others appear shocked as well and even Natasha takes a tiny half-step back, unnoticeable to anyone but Steve and the Soldier, who pauses in his litany for a brief moment.

Natasha listens for a few minutes and then quirks her head. “Soldier, can you repeat that?” she asks.

The Soldier doesn’t nod but he does repeat, “’I’m so glad I’m your soulmate, not anyone else.’”

Clint exhales harshly. “That would’ve been the start of it, suggesting that Sarkissian is the only possible third.”

The Soldier continues his recitation. Steve picks up on her next suggestion, the barest hint of Ophelia suggesting Bucky ignore anyone who claimed to be their soulmate. Rhodey spots when Ophelia had started turning Bucky against the team and Sharon figures out that she’d suggested he start coming to see her without the others.

That final suggestion had been made only a few days earlier, only three days before Tony had been taken. Bucky had been odder than usual the next day, snappish and angry. Steve had gotten fed up and gone to bed without him. Looking back, he isn’t actually sure that Bucky had even gone to bed that night and now, he wonders if Bucky had actually gone to Ophelia.

The Soldier stops talking and waits, infinitely patient.

“What happened next?” Natasha prompts.

“The Asset returned to its handler the following night. Sarkissian was informed that she could not be the Asset’s soulmate.”

The nice thing about the containment room is that it has multiple cameras filming from different angles, which means that Steve can see the gleam in Natasha’s eyes as she asks, “Why not?”

If Steve didn’t know any better, he’d say that the Soldier looks almost vindictively gleeful when he responds, “Because the Asset already knows who he is.”

“ _What?_ ” Steve exclaims.

There’s a flurry of movement from the rest of the team, Sam and Clint both jumping up to run to Steve, Rhodes yelling, “He already knows?” and Pepper asking, “Why didn’t he say anything?”

Natasha seems entirely unfazed by the revelation that the Winter Soldier knows who Steve and Bucky’s third soulmate is. “Who?” she asks coolly.

“The name is unknown.”

“Then—”

“A picture was provided instead.”

Steve’s heart leaps into his throat as the Soldier pulls a folded scrap of paper out of his pants pocket. Natasha unfolds it with gentle hands. From the camera’s angle, the team can only get a vague glimpse of the drawing but Steve doesn’t need anything more. He’s drawn that face hundreds of times before, seen it in his dreams for years, fantasized about holding the man close to him. Even though it’s so much younger than he’s ever seen it, he can still recognize it.

_Tony._

* * *

Look, Steve knows he fucked up but even he hadn’t realized it was _this_ bad.

“It can’t be Tony,” he whispers brokenly, head buried in his hands. The room is empty of all but him and Natasha, cleared out after the revelation and Steve’s fury that everyone else had known but him and maybe Bucky, as it was still unclear if just the Soldier knew or Bucky had as well.

“It is,” Natasha says simply but not unsympathetically. When he looks at her, she looks softer than she usually does when she looks at him.

“Why didn’t he _say_ something? We wanted it to be him,” he murmurs, lost in a daze, a fog of realizing that Tony is their missing third. “Buck said he kept hoping that Tony would show up and stop us from going to meet Rosie Allen. We—we were going to ask him out. We— _I_ felt incomplete for years and Tony was just right under my nose.”

“He thought you had rejected him,” Natasha says quietly.

“When? I never even knew; how could I reject him?”

“Couple years ago, back when Tony went back to Malibu.”

Steve gapes at her because he remembers that day, feeling more lost than he ever had, Natasha’s casually cruel question about the identity of his soulmate, the renewed grief of losing Bucky on the anniversary of his revival. “He thought that was a _rejection_? I wasn’t rejecting him. I—” _I didn’t know he was mine to reject_. “I’d come out of the ice exactly two years earlier.”

Natasha inhales sharply. “You were remembering. No wonder you said you’d already found them.”

“I knew back then that I had a third,” Steve admits. He chews on the inside of his cheek for a moment before deciding to continue. “But I didn’t know if they were already dead or older than me or—” He stops and takes a frustrated breath, unsure why it’s so hard to explain this. “It was hard most days but that day, it felt like I’d just lost Bucky all over again and here was Tony and my feelings towards him were confusing and new, so I didn’t say I thought I had a third. If I’d known—” He stops again. He doesn’t actually know what he would have done if he’d known that Tony was his missing soulmate. He likes to think that he would have gotten together with Tony and they would have lived happily ever after but his brain had been so fucked up that day. Maybe he would have explicitly rejected Tony instead of just implying it.

He looks at Natasha. “But you knew. Why didn’t _you_ say anything?”

“Tony wasn’t ready for it,” she replies simply. “After what he perceived as your rejection, he would have taken me interceding as pity, taken _you_ as pity. I kept thinking he would be ready, that there would be another time, but…”

“There never was,” Steve finishes for her. “Not until we announced we were looking for our third.”

“He didn’t say anything then because I convinced him not to,” Natasha says, clearly anticipating his next question. “He wanted to, Steve. He wanted to so badly. I thought it would be romantic though if we waited a few months.” She hesitates. Steve can tell that she wants to explain further but he’s pretty sure he’s heard enough.

He bites out, “That wasn’t your place.”

“I know,” Natasha whispers. “I shouldn’t have made him wait. Everything went wrong and then it just kept getting worse and you and Bucky—”

She stops but Steve can finish the rest of the sentence. He and Bucky had been so caught up in the heartbreak of what could have been that they’d missed what had been and so Tony had slipped past their notice and they’d turned him down flat. They’d done exactly what Tony had been afraid they would do and rejected him.

“Get out,” he mutters.

Natasha doesn’t hesitate to leave but she does say as she’s leaving, “You shouldn’t be alone.”

“Are you going to make that decision for me too?”

She leaves.

* * *

Tony’s been missing for ninety hours before Thor returns.

They’re mostly sitting in one of the conference rooms. Sharon is on the phone with someone who nominally lives in Uzbekistan but is speaking with a South American accent from what Steve can tell. Rhodes and Pepper are combing through CCTV footage of the city with JARVIS’ aid, looking without much hope for a glimpse of Tony in one of the numerous vans on the road the day he’d been kidnapped. Bruce is down in his lab, running a chemical analysis on something he found in the alley Sarkissian had taken Tony to. Natasha and Clint are both on the phone with ex-SHIELD agents, trying to see if they’d picked up any chatter.

Steve’s been alternating his time between the conference room, desperate for word about Tony, his floor, too angry about how everything’s gone down to spend time with the others, and Bucky’s cell. Bucky had returned to normal the previous day. Steve had wasted no time in telling him everything that had happened, including Ophelia’s deception, Bucky’s trigger words, and the reality of Tony’s mark. Bucky had been horrified at how he’d been used, confirming Steve’s suspicion that he hadn’t known about the words.

“I don’t have a lot of memories from the Soldier,” Bucky had said, sitting on the floor, rocking back and forth. Steve had ached to go to him but Natasha had warned him that there were operatives who could seem normal but be activated by the smallest hint. “I can remember some targets, a few missions, but they would wipe me before and after missions. I don’t remember how they used to activate me.”

The revelation that Tony is actually their third had been met with elation and then terrible, gut-wrenching heartbreak.

“We had him, Stevie,” Bucky had sobbed. He’d leaned up against the glass, holding up his palm so that Steve could press his against Bucky’s through the window. “We had him and we let him go. We _lost_ him.”

Steve is in the conference room now, watching the others work and feeling useless about how little he’s been able to help. The first day Tony had gone missing, after he’d found out about Tony’s mark, he’d gone out into the city to clear his head and ended up at one of the soup kitchens he volunteered at.

One of the other volunteers had noticed how upset he’d seemed and offered an ear. Steve had told her about Tony’s kidnapping.

“You know,” she’d said. “It’s a sad fact of our society but a lot of people don’t notice the homeless. You might consider asking if they’ve seen anything.”

Steve hadn’t wanted to, feeling like it might be taking advantage of them, but he’d agreed eventually, too worried about Tony to refuse forever. As it turned out, none of the people at the soup kitchen had seen anything but they’d all promised to put the word out.

He hasn’t heard back from more than a few, all of whom told him they haven’t heard anything either, when there’s a crack of thunder followed by a blinding flash of light out on Thor’s landing pad.

“My friends!” Thor exclaims as he strides inside. “I bring news. Heimdall was indeed able to find Tony.”

All heads snapped up. “Where?” Steve demands.

“A facility in Bulgaria. Heimdall has shown it to me so that I may guide you.”

Steve scrambles up from his chair, followed by the others. “Avengers,” he calls as he leaves the room. “Assemble.”

* * *

He finds Bucky pacing anxiously in his cell. “Is everything okay?” Bucky asks as soon as Steve walks through the door. “I heard thunder. Is Thor back?”

“He’s found Tony,” Steve says. He pulls on his gloves, still finishing putting on his uniform.

“And we’re going after him, right?”

Steve hesitates. “ _We_ are,” he confirms. “ _You’re_ staying here.”

Bucky’s face falls. “Because of the words,” he says dully. “You don’t know if you can trust me.”

“Buck—”

“Don’t patronize me,” Bucky snaps. “You don’t know if Sarkissian or anyone else will be able to activate me so you can’t take me.” He sits down heavily on the bed they’ve provided for him. “I get it, I do. I wish it was different but I get it. Just promise me two things.”

“Anything,” Steve swears, desperate to get out of there. He can’t do this, can’t look at the naked hope on Bucky’s face when he’s failed him this badly.

Bucky’s eyes are dark and cold when he looks at Steve.

“Promise me you’ll snap that bitch’s neck the moment you see her—and promise me you’ll bring our soulmate home.”

Steve shivers. He hasn’t let himself say those words yet— _our soulmate_ —too afraid that it’ll turn out to be a dream if he does but oh how he wants to.

“I promise.”

* * *

Steve looks at his team in the Quinjet. Natasha is strapping on her Widow’s Bites, eyes as empty and soulless as the monster people accuse her of being. Clint is sitting beside her, checking the poisoned tips of his arrows, meant to kill not injure. On Natasha’s other side, Thor leans back against the wall of the jet. His eyes are closed like he’s sleeping but Steve can see the tension in his body. He’s ready. At the front of the plane, Maria pilots the jet expertly. She’s talking quietly with Sharon, who’s loading bullets into three guns laid out on the dashboard in front of her. On the other side of the jet, Rhodes waits in the War Machine armor. He has a computer on his lap, keeping an eye on the footage of HYDRA’s facility provided by SI’s satellite. Sam is beside him inspecting his wings for any minute mechanical failures that might translate into major ones in the air. Bruce is only a few steps away, preparing the jet’s small medical facility. Bruce claims that the Hulk won’t be needed for this one and that they don’t know what condition Tony will be in but Steve can see the green shifting below Bruce’s skin. The Hulk adores Tony; he’ll want to see him safe.

“Approaching the drop-off point,” Maria announces.

Steve tightens the strap on his shield.

They’re ready.

* * *

HYDRA’s facility is well-manned but the Avengers are angry and highly skilled. They go in through the front door because these monsters _took_ Tony. Steve wants them to know that the team came for him, that they didn’t get away with it. Cut off one head, two more will take its place, but the way to kill a hydra as always been to burn the head as it’s cut off and Steve intends to _burn this place to the ground_.

He can hear thunder gathering behind him, the crackle of Natasha’s Bites, the roar of the Hulk in the distance. Rhodes’ repulsors are firing and the whine is familiar but not and it only makes Steve angrier. The shield spins on his next throw, decapitating a foot soldier with a spray of arterial blood.

“This place is a maze,” Rhodes tells them. “JARVIS has multiple levels, numerous dead ends—”

“Your orders, Cap,” Natasha says, ceding control.

“We’ll split up,” Steve decides. “Thor, you’re with Hulk. Anything that might be unimportant, bring it down. Keep HYDRA scattered.”

Thor says, “Aye.” Hulk snarls but lumbers after the god.

“Falcon, War Machine, you’re in the air. Don’t let anyone get away.”

“You got it, Cap,” Sam says.

More reluctantly, Rhodes says, “Can do.”

Steve winces. He knows that Rhodes wants to look for Tony himself but they need him in the air more. These fuckers can’t be allowed to escape with Tony again.

“Hill, Thirteen, you’re together. Widow, Hawkeye, that leaves you two.”

Actually, that leaves him but he’s so used to having Bucky at his six that it takes him a moment to realize he’ll be on his own. None of the others call him out on it though and he’s more than capable of taking care of himself so he doesn’t draw attention to the fact.

He pulls up a schematic of the building, sent from JARVIS to a device Tony had made him a year ago. “We’ll start with the first level and work our way down. Hill, Thirteen, you’ve got this sector here; Widow and Hawkeye, you’re here; and I’ll take this one.”

The team splits up. Steve sets off down a long hallway. Unusually, the comms are quiet, the team entirely focused on their mission. Steve’s enhanced hearing can pick up on occasional screams and grunts through the earpieces but he doubts there’s anything more than silence in the ears of the others. His sector is mostly clear, only a few HYDRA goons to clear out.

He clears the level quickly. “I’m going down,” he says.

“Roger that, Cap,” Natasha says. “Hawkeye and I are going down as well.”

“We’re just finishing up here,” Sharon cuts in. “Be down in a bit.”

Steve continues. The fighting gets thicker as he makes his way further down. Relishing the thought of getting rid of some of the nervous energy that’s been swimming under his skin since Tony had been take, he wades into the fight.

At one point, while he’s on the fourth level, his comm crackles. “Cap, I’ve got eyes on the scepter,” Hill says.

“Bring it to me,” Thor commands.

Steve nods even though he knows the others can’t see it. “Agreed. Take it to Thor. Thirteen, are you good down here on your own?”

“Having the time of my life,” Sharon snaps. Steve can just picture the vicious twist to her mouth. He can’t imagine forcing her out of the building when she’s so close to her cousin. He’s never had any family that close but he thinks it must be like if Bucky were to still be missing.

“Heard,” he acknowledges.

He turns a corner to find a lone foot soldier. The man raises his gun but Steve’s on him faster than that. He slams the man’s head into the wall, pressing on his wrist with sure fingers. The man drops the gun.

“Where are you keeping him?” he demands.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the man snarls.

Steve slams his head against the wall again.

“ _Where?_ ”

The man stubbornly keeps his mouth shut.

Steve gets his hand around the man’s neck and starts to squeeze. “You seem to be laboring under the mistaken impression that I won’t kill you. Let me correct that assumption. You took my soulmate and you’re going to. Give. Him. Back.” He squeezes just that tiny bit harder. The man scrambles at his hand but Steve’s stronger than he’ll ever be. “Now, where is he?”

“Down another level,” the man wheezes. “Room 218.”

Steve throws him through several brick walls and continues on his way. The rooms are getting darker now, though whether that’s a fault of the paint or the lighting he can’t say. It certainly matches the darkness of the facility and it nearly matches the darkness swirling in his soul.

He finds the room and kicks the door open. It flies across the room, slamming against the opposite wall. A shot rings in the otherwise quiet room. Automatically, Steve jerks back. A bullet whizzes by his ear.

He readies himself to throw his shield but a voice with an Eastern European accent—a _familiar_ voice—says, “I wouldn’t do that.”

Steve’s eyes adjust to the gloom of the darkened room (god, they kept Tony caged up in the _dark_ ) and he sees Sarkissian standing near the back of the room. She’s holding Tony to her with one arm. The other hand holds a gun just below Tony’s chin, tilted into his head.

“You throw that shield, maybe you knock the gun out of my hand, but maybe you hit your lovely soulmate instead,” Sarkissian continues. Steve lowers the shield but keeps a ready grip on it.

He looks Tony over. Tony is distressingly limp, his hair matted with blood from a messy wound near his temple. His nose looks broken, left eye so swollen Steve doubts he’d be able to open it even if he _were_ awake. Both hands and bare feet are bloodied and the fingers on his right hand are mangled. Steve’s heart lurches at the sight— _no, not Tony’s hands_.

“Let him go,” he says lowly.

Sarkissian laughs hysterically. “Let go of my leverage? I don’t think so.”

“You’re more likely to live if you do.”

“Ooh,” she mocks. “Would Captain America kill someone?”

“You tortured my soulmates.”

She laughs again, a cackle that grates on Steve’s ears. “You didn’t even know this one was yours. It was so easy, you were so _desperate_ to get away from him. Poor baby, he’s been screaming for you, you and your precious _Bucky_ ,” she says nastily, shaking Tony in her grasp.

Tony lets out a choked, broken whimper. Steve takes a step forward, aborted when Sarkissian cocks the gun in her hand.

“Don’t come any closer,” she warns.

In his ear, Steve hears Natasha say, “We’re on our way to your location, Cap. Keep her talking.”

_Keep her talking._

“Kind of cliché, don’t you think?” he asks.

She arches an eyebrow. The low light twists her face into something monstrous—or maybe that’s just the fact that she’s holding onto Tony. “Who cares about cliché when I’ve won?”

“You haven’t won yet.”

“Oh, no? I’ve got your soulmates here with me. If you do anything, I’ll have this one killed. And then I’ll make you watch as I make your other soulmate kill your teammates. They’ll be easy to round up once this one is dead. What is it you said about him? He’s the heart of the team?”

Steve frowns, saying slowly, “You don’t have my soulmates.”

“Don’t I?” Sarkissian says with a triumphant smirk. “I’ve got Stark right here and as for your poor, _pathetic_ Bucky, he broke out of his cell only minutes after you left. Came straight here to help, only you must have been dragging your feet because when he landed, the only people he was greeted with were my soldiers.”

“You’re lying,” Steve says, trying not to show his growing panic because Bucky couldn’t have—he _couldn’t—_ he couldn’t have come here to help, not when he’s supposed to still be safe at the Tower.

One side of Sarkissian’s mouth curls up. “солдат?” she calls.

And a door on the other side of the room, one that Steve hasn’t yet noticed, swings open and Bucky walks through. Only this isn’t Bucky. This is the Winter Soldier that Steve has met before, dreads to think of, haunts his nightmares.

“Bucky,” he whispers and the Soldier shows no sign of hearing him.

“This is my soldier,” Sarkissian purrs. “My Fist of HYDRA, the one who will help me usher in a new world order, and it’s so much sweeter that he’s yours, your darling, your love, your _Bucky_.”

Steve raises the shield again. He’s been waiting, waiting for the team to get there but he doesn’t know where they are and he can’t wait, not when both Tony and Bucky are in danger.

Sarkissian’s eyes flash. “Don’t—”

Steve takes another step forward, preparing to throw the shield. He can see it in his mind’s eye, the exact angle he needs to incapacitate Sarkissian without hurting Tony. He just needs to be closer. He can see it—but Sarkissian can see it too.

“Kill him!” she yells.

It happens in slow motion—

Bucky raises his gun—

Tony twists out of Sarkissian’s grasp—

Throws himself forward—

There’s a BANG as Bucky’s gun goes off—

Another as Sarkissian’s fires—

Tony’s body jerks as one shot slams into his shoulder—

He spins—

The second shot buries itself in his stomach—

Tony looks down at the growing patch of blood on his stomach and starts to crumple—

And Steve screams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In order to get information from the Winter Soldier, Natasha uses the trigger warnings on Bucky. This is not discussed with Bucky though it is discussed with Steve.
> 
> Tony has clearly been tortured by the time the team finds him and when Steve gets to him, Bucky has been activated again and is ordered to kill Steve. Tony jumps in front of Steve to save him and is shot once by Bucky and once by Sarkissian.
> 
> Russian translations are mostly the trigger words. As for the other ones:  
> солдат = soldier  
> Готовы подчиниться = Ready to comply.


	8. Let the Fire Be Your Crown

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Bucky wakes up, has a realization, and leaves

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for canon-typical violence, semi-graphic depictions of violence, and temporary character death
> 
> Also friendly reminder that, unless you're asking me to tag something, I don't accept concrit

Sometimes, the Asset has a dream. In the dream, he’s standing in a doorway and there’s a young man asleep in a bed. The Asset is there for something nefarious—what, he can never remember—but then the young man throws his arm up over his head and the Asset sees a phoenix matching the one on his wrist. Sometimes, the Asset just leaves but sometimes, he straddles the young man. The Asset knows that most times, when he does this, he doesn’t know what color eyes the young man has but this time, his eyes open. They’re beautiful and brown, big and wide with fear at first but then, all at once, he relaxes under the Asset and purrs, “James.” He runs a gentle hand up the Asset’s metal arm, unafraid of it. The Asset wants to tell him that he should be afraid but he can’t speak the words, not in this perfect suspended moment. He brings his mouth down to the young man’s and whispers, “ _Tony._ ”

* * *

Someone is crying.

There’s a man laying prone on the ground, a dark pool of red spreading out from beneath his body, and over him, another man—the one wailing—is slumped, cradling the first one’s head. And there only a few steps away is the Asset’s mistress, the handler above all others. She’s raising a gun to the head of the crying man and he should see her but he doesn’t, too focused on his distress. The Asset isn’t supposed to do anything. His job is over.

But he does.

He pivots, aims, and fires all in one smooth motion. The woman gapes at him, clutching a hand to her chest as blood spills through her fingers. “солдат,” she croaks. He watches impassively as she falls to her knees. _She’s taking too long_ , the voice in the back of his head hisses. The Asset raises his gun again, aims between her eyes. He can’t miss, not from this range.

He fires.

Gracelessly, she collapses backward. The Asset has worked for HYDRA for seventy years. He knows when an enemy is dead. He feels no fear in turning from her body to the men on the ground.

He knows them, knows them both. Remembers the blond one as smaller long ago but now he means bright laughter and a sweet kiss, a hand beneath his back, lifting him up toward bliss. The brunet—that one haunts his dreams, that one isn’t the Asset’s, not in this lifetime, but he’s supposed to be. That one is warm blankets, gentle hands, and the ever-present smell of good coffee.

That one is—is bleeding out and there’re two bullet holes in him and one of them came from the dead woman behind him but he’d heard two shots and—and the Asset had been aiming for the blond, he knows he had, only—

The Asset shot him.

He’s keening brokenly, backing away until he slips in a puddle of blood. He goes down, still scrambling away until his back hits the wall. He hurt him. The Asset had promised never to hurt that one, had told himself he would protect him. But he failed. The woman’s orders, poisonous words dripped into the Asset’s ear, had overwhelmed him and it’s luck that kept the brunet from being killed, luck that pulled the Asset’s shot at the last minute. He never misses but he missed this time.

The door slams open again, spilling a small crowd into the room. The Asset knows their faces, has been shown them before. He’s supposed to shoot to kill on sight. But there are other memories flooding in, of the redhead and the ballet slippers on her wrist that she doesn’t remember, of the archer challenging the Asset to a contest and taking the loss gracefully, of the one in the red cape and an explanation of the souls his people sees. And above it all is the reminder—he disobeyed, he hurt the one he’d promised to save. He’s supposed to shoot but he’s too horrified and instead, he tosses the gun away, drawing the attention of the archer, whose head snaps first to the gun and then to the Asset.

“Thor,” the redhead says urgently. “The Acibadem City Clinic in Sofia. Dr. Cho’s already waiting there.”

“Aye,” the one in the cape agrees. He approaches the blond man. “Steven, you have to let him go.”

“ _No_ ,” Steven (Stevie?) sobs.

“Steve,” the redhead says. “We can get him help but you have to let him go.”

“I can’t, I—”

“Clint, help me!” the redhead exclaims. The archer snaps his head back to her before leaping forward to help her pull Steven off and away from the brunet.

“Protect Anthony,” Thor says shortly. He moves to a slightly open space on the floor, whirls the hammer in his hand around, and then releases it. The hammer flies upward, smashing through the ceiling of both this room and the one above it and above and so on until it’s out of sight. Bricks rain down around Thor but he seems unbothered by them other than making sure the brunet is unharmed. The hammer returns to the man’s hand. He sets it on the ground so he can unclip his coat and wrap the brunet in it. Then he bundles him into his arms, lifts the hammer, and takes flight.

Steven is still hysterical though the redhead is kneeling beside him, trying to calm him down. A blonde woman pokes her head inside. “Thor is clear of HYDRA airspace,” she announces. “But we’ll want to move fast. The Hulk got a little too excited tearing apart the building.”

As if it was just waiting for her words, the building gives an ominous shudder. “I’ve got Falcon and War Machine flying in for evac,” she continues, sounding mostly unbothered by the possibility of the structure collapsing but the Asset can see the worry in her eyes. At first, he thinks it’s because of the building but then he follows her gaze to the blood left behind by the brunet. She’s worried about him too.

“Tell them we need multiple trips,” the archer—Clint—says. He nods at the Asset. “Bucky followed us.”

The blonde woman whirls to look at him. “ _Fuck_ ,” she breathes out. “Is that even Bucky in there?”

Bucky sounds familiar but that’s not the Asset’s name. The Asset is nameless; his past handlers had taken his name from him. He opens his mouth, preparing to tell them that, when he thinks of a soft, sleepy voice saying, “James?”

“James,” he tells them.

Clint seems to understand at once. “Can you come with us, James?” he asks, holding out a hand.

“I shouldn’t,” he says. “I hurt him. I shouldn’t—”

“Tony’s gonna want you there,” Clint says coaxingly. “The last time he saw you, you were in danger. He’ll be worried.”

“But I hurt him.”

“No, _Sarkissian_ hurt him.”

“I _shot_ him.” He doesn’t know why he’s saying these things. The Asset had been trained well—keep his mouth shut, deny their accusations. And if he keeps talking, maybe they won’t let him see Tony, but he needs them to know.

“Looks like you tried not to,” someone new says and it’s a mark of how far he’s fallen if he’d completely missed her coming into the room.

Clint frowns at her. “What do you mean?”

She holds up a red, shiny bullet fragment. “Based on where I found this, it’s from the bullet in Tony’s shoulder. It matches James’ gun, not Sarkissian’s.”

Clint beams triumphantly, the same sort of forced nonchalance that James had seen on the blonde woman. They’re all much more worried than they’re pretending. He wonders if that’s for his benefit or for the man that’s still shaking.

“See?” Clint points out. “You pulled your shot. You tried to miss him. Now look, we’ve got friends, they’re gonna be down here any moment. We can’t leave you behind. You may not remember it but we’re friends. Friends don’t leave each other.”

He’s lying. James can see it in his eyes. They’ve left him behind before. But Clint isn’t lying now. They don’t want to leave him behind this time.

Maybe they’ll get to the hospital and Tony will send him away. But maybe he won’t. Either way, James won’t know unless he goes. He’s never been afraid of painful truths. That’s what his entire life has become.

There’s the whining of something electric ( _repulsors_ , something in his brain tells him) and then a metal man lands beside them. “How many passengers do we have?” he asks.

“Six,” the redhead says. James can’t really tell because the man is made of metal but he thinks maybe the eyes behind the mask flick towards him.

“Here’s how we’re going to do this,” the metal man says eventually. “Tony had this trick. I’m going to grab onto Steve and Bucky—”

“James,” Clint cuts in.

“James then. Then I’m going to send an electrical current through you. It’ll freeze your arm, keep you locked on to me. I’ll lift off, you grab on to the next person, and keep going like that. None of you will be able to let go. I’ve got you all.”

* * *

Bucky awakens in the hospital, his head leaning on Steve’s shoulder. It’s not the smell of a hospital that he recognizes, which means that it’s not the medical bay in the tower. He can hear the sounds of his teammates—the reassuring brush of Clint’s hand on his bow, the whisper of Nat’s hair as she braids it and unbraids it, the creak of leather as Rhodes’ fingers clench on the armrests of his chair—but that’s all it is: sounds. There’s no talking, not even quiet murmuring, which means that it’s bad.

He tries to think back, to remember what they had been fighting. He remembers—he remembers finding out that Ophelia was HYDRA—remembers escaping his cell to go after Stevie—remembers telling JARVIS he’d need to travel fast to catch up and ceding control of the jet to the AI—remembers landing and finding nothing but soldiers and no sign of his teammates. He doesn’t remember _anything_ after that.

But there’s a more pressing concern than his missing memory. He can’t hear the near-silent whir of the arc reactor, which means that Tony isn’t with them, which means that _Tony_ is the one who’s injured so badly.

“Stevie,” he whispers, praying desperately that he’s wrong. “Stevie, where’s Tony?”

Steve doesn’t answer him and when Bucky looks up, he realizes that silent tears are dripping down his soulmate’s face. He sits up suddenly, ignoring the alarm on his teammates’ faces. “Where’s Tony?” he demands, eyeing the way their faces all fall. “He’s not—he’s not _dead_?”

“Which are you?” Sharon asks instead and Bucky’s blood runs cold. He knows exactly what happened if she’s asking that question.

“I’m Bucky,” he says but it’s hesitant and her eyes narrow.

“Which are you _really_?” she repeats.

“I’m Bucky,” he says again, firmer this time.

Clint sits up, almost dislodging Nat who has her legs thrown across his. “Tell us something only Bucky knows.”

Bucky thinks about it for a while and then says quietly, “Our third soulmate isn’t Sarkissian.”

“The Winter Soldier could have told us _that_ ,” Sharon snaps.

“What’s your soulmate’s name?” Clint asks calmly, ignoring her.

He doesn’t know why the Asset wouldn’t be able to tell them that part if he knows Sarkissian isn’t it. He also can’t think of a name other than—“Tony.” For a moment, he thinks it’s the old wishful thinking, come back to haunt him. Then Nat bows her head and he knows that it’s true though he doesn’t remember when he learned that. “It’s Tony, isn’t it?”

His breath shudders in his chest as memories come flooding in, of Sarkissian holding a gun to Tony’s head as she activates the Winter Soldier, of waiting in a darkened room for her call, of raising his gun to Steve’s heart and twitching it aside at the last moment when he realizes that Tony has thrown himself in front of the bullet, of Bucky’s bullet slamming into his shoulder, of Ophelia’s burying itself in his stomach.

“Oh god,” he whispers. “I shot him. It’s my fault he’s in there.”

“It’s Sarkissian’s fault,” Clint says sharply. “She’s the one who took him.”

“I shouldn’t have followed you,” he gasps out, ignoring Clint entirely. “I just wanted to help, I didn’t think I’d get there before you. I shouldn’t have—I _shot_ him. This is my fault.”

“No,” Steve says hollowly. “It’s mine. I’m the one who told him I only had one soulmate. He thought we would reject him because of me. I’m the reason he thought he couldn’t tell us. We wouldn’t have gone looking for Sarkissian if he’d felt safe enough to talk to us.”

“You two can play the blame game later,” Rhodes snaps. “Right now, Tony is in there and he could be—” He cuts off as his voice breaks. He takes several gasping breaths, eyes glistening with unshed tears. “He’s in there and he’s injured. He needs us at our best, not arguing over who gets to take the blame.”

Bucky could point at that they’re not doing a whole lot of good sitting out here in the waiting room. He could point out that he deserves to be arrested for the things he’s done. But Rhodes looks like he’s on the verge of shattering apart if someone so much as breathes on him wrong so instead, Bucky keeps his mouth shut. He crawls into Steve’s lap and wraps his arms around his waist, offering silent comfort to his soulmate.

They’re all staring at the metal double doors on the far side of the waiting room, where on the other side, Tony is fighting for his life. Because he was shot. Because Bucky managed to get himself captured. Because he settled for someone who wasn’t his soulmate, wasn’t _his_. Why had he done that? Why hadn’t they just asked Tony who his soulmate was? Why had they decided they knew what was best for Tony and never even bothered to _ask_ him what he wanted?

They’d been planning to ask him out. Why had they just let him go when they’d seen his mark? How could they have let cowardice overwhelm them?

“I fucked up,” Steve whispers a few minutes later. He’s speaking so softly that Bucky has to strain to hear him, meaning that the rest of the team _definitely_ doesn’t hear him, which is probably a good thing or else it might upset them more.

Just as softly, he replies, “ _We_ fucked up. Both of us, Stevie. We _both_ decided that a potential soulmate was more important than what we already had. But it’s gonna be okay. _Tony’s_ gonna be okay and we’ll make it up to him. We can do this better.”

Steve looks at him with sad eyes. He looks tired in a way that he hasn’t in years, since before he got the serum. “What if he doesn’t want us to?”

Bucky doesn’t want to think about that, just like he doesn’t want to think about what will happen if Tony doesn’t come out of that operating room. “Then we let him know we’ll always be there if he wants us,” he says eventually. “And we respect his choice.”

They don’t have any right to do any less, especially after what they did to him. Fuck but just thinking about how they did exactly what Tony said they would makes him want to be sick. He and Steve had spent so much time talking about how they wanted to be Tony’s, in any way that he would take them, but the first hint that Tony couldn’t be _theirs_ , they’d gone running in the other direction right into Ophelia’s arms. Tony had said they would reject him and that’s exactly what they’d done.

Bucky wouldn’t blame him if Tony never wanted to talk to them again.

He looks around at the rest of the team. He doesn’t know how much time he lost being locked up in the Hulk’s cage but it had to have been days judging by how haggard and wrung-out they look. Nat especially looks like she hasn’t slept in days and Rhodes and Sharon don’t look much better.

After a moment, he climbs off of Stevie’s lap and walks over to Rhodes. “Can I join you?” he asks quietly. Rhodes nods silently so he sits beside him. “I think I remember attacking you so I’m pretty sure that means I owe you an apology.”

Rhodes huffs. “Wasn’t you.”

“Will you just accept the damn apology?” Bucky snaps. Rhodes slowly turns to look at him. “Sorry. Everyone keeps saying that it wasn’t my fault but the Soldier’s still wearing my face and _he_ won’t apologize so that means it’s up to me.”

Rhodes blinks at him and it’s so reminiscent of Tony that Bucky can’t help but smile. “It’s okay,” he says. “I probably would attack anyone who said Pepper’s a bad guy too.”

“Did you know?” Bucky asks after a long moment, partially wanting to distract Rhodes from those metal doors and partially because he has to _know_. “That we’re Tony’s?”

“That’s an interesting way of putting it,” Rhodes says.

“I think I lost all right to call Tony ‘mine’ when I turned him down at dinner,” Bucky says honestly. That will probably always hurt, that he had had Tony right within his grasp—and been too tied up in his own hurt to realize what Tony had really been saying.

After another pause, Rhodes leans back in his chair. It’s a calculated move, meant to make him look relaxed, but Bucky can calculate line of sight in his mind and is pretty certain that Rhodes is trying to look through the windows on the doors.

“No,” Rhodes says. “I didn’t know. I knew that Tony had a mark but he said it was broken.” His mouth twists. Bucky can fill in what he’s not saying. Tony had said that _he_ was broken. “It—it flickered. Sometimes, he would have a mark and sometimes, there was nothing. Knowing what we know now about Steve’s time in the ice, I think he’s probably figured out that his soulmate had been dying but it was going on for decades. Tony—Tony was convinced that it was defective.”

“You didn’t know that we matched?”

He shakes his head. “I would have said something. I never saw yours or Steve’s when I visited and I only ever got to see Tony’s once while we were still in college. He always kept it hidden behind a band or that fake skin.”

“We rejected him,” Bucky says quietly. “I—I always thought that if he had our mark, we wouldn’t but we did.”

“Yeah,” Rhodes agrees with a nod. “You did. But you also didn’t have all the information. There’s no way either of you could have guessed that Tony wouldn’t tell you.”

“We should have known,” Bucky states.

“What? That Howard Stark would have told Tony that his mark was defective because _he_ was and that Tony internalized that to this day? Sure, you should have known,” Rhodes replies dryly.

Bucky frowns. “I would have thought you’d be angrier.”

“I was. I probably still am. But my best friend is in there fighting for his life. This is not the time to be angry.”

Bucky won’t pretend like he gets it. He _is_ angry—at Tony for deciding that he knew what Steve and Bucky were thinking, at Steve for ruining it for them before it had even begun, at himself for not figuring it out. He’s furious, wants to break something. They wasted so much time. And now—now they might not have any time at all. Tony is in there fighting for his _life_ and Bucky never once got the chance to hold him the way he wanted.

He slumps back in his chair, anger draining out of him as quickly as it had come on. Rhodes is right, he realizes. His anger is misplaced in this moment, selfish that his thoughts are turned inward and not on Tony. Fuck, Tony could be _dying_ and Bucky’s sitting here thinking about how that will affect _him_. The barest traces of revulsion start to stir in his gut but before he can fixate on them—

The metal doors swing open and Helen Cho walks through. The team straightens, all eyes turning toward her. She looks weary, heartsore. Bucky has lost time during his time as Sarkissian’s plaything but he can take one look at Dr. Cho and know it’s been hours, hours that Tony’s been in there, hours that the doctors have been working to save his life. More importantly, he looks at her haggard face and knows—just _knows_ —that she doesn’t have good news.

“Is Tony—?” Steve begins fearfully, falling silent when Dr. Cho holds up a hand.

“I should be speaking just to Rhodey,” she says, the familiar name reminding Bucky that she’s known Tony and Rhodey for years. She’s been taking care of Tony since Afghanistan. If anyone can save him, she can. That doesn’t stop the building apprehension in the pit of his stomach. “As he’s Tony’s medical proxy. But we have a unique situation with his soulmates not matching up with his proxy and I thought it best to speak to all of you.” She pauses, helplessly spreading her hands. “In short, Tony is dying. The wound in his stomach went septic. He’s losing blood faster than we can pump it in, he’s going into cardiac arrest every couple of minutes. We’re losing him and we’re running out of time.”

Rhodes’ breath hitches as he asks, “What are you saying?”

“There’s nothing in his records about trying to keep him alive.” Bucky wants to jump to his feet, shout that maybe Tony just hadn’t thought about it but that was no reason to just _give up_. Then she continues, “He was awake for a few minutes earlier. He asked for Extremis.”

Bucky’s heard about Extremis, has heard about Tony’s run-in with the Mandarin during one of their late night conversations, has seen the things that Pepper can do when she gets too angry. “Isn’t that—?” he asks.

“It’s dangerous,” Cho agrees. “It was meant to be a last resort.”

“Is it even _stable_?” Bruce asks. He nervously pulls off his glasses, cleaning them with one of his ever-present wipes. “Tony said he could make it retroactively stable but no guarantees of success.”

Cho’s hands tighten on her clipboard. “We’ve been working together to synthesize a different version of the Extremis virus, one that wouldn’t have many of the same effects as Killian’s but would still heal. Mostly hypothetical but we have one vial. An untested vial.”

“Then why aren’t you in there?” Bucky snarls. “He asked for it—”

“Because I don’t consider that informed consent!” Cho snaps right back. “ _That’s_ why I’m asking Rhodey.”

Bucky whips around to look at Rhodes. “Jim, you have to,” he pleads without waiting to see what Rhodes will say. “It’s Tony. You know he’d do the same for any of us.”

“Please,” Steve agrees desperately. “It’s _Tony_.”

There’s this terrible hesitation in Rhodes’ eyes, one that Bucky can’t—or perhaps _won’t_ —understand, and all the way until he opens his mouth, Bucky has no idea what he’ll say. “Is it his best chance?” Rhodes asks quietly.

“His _only_ one,” Cho states solemnly. “And I can’t make any promises that he’ll survive the procedure. It will be painful. It’s very possible that the pain may kill him even if the shock doesn’t. And if he dies, he could burn down the entire hospital. We’ve begun evacuating everyone who can be moved.”

“We’re staying,” Steve interrupts. Bucky nods, followed by Nat and Bruce.

She nods like she’d expected nothing less and then turns back to Rhodes. “Jim?” she prompts.

Rhodes looks at Bucky. He should be better. He’s supposed to be the pragmatic one. He should point out that it’s an untested medical procedure in a central location. He should mention that there’s a very high likelihood that Tony still won’t make it, that they’ll be given false hope just to have it snatched away. But he’s not better. He’s selfish and desperate for one more chance to hold Tony in his arms. He keeps his mouth shut, keeps his doubts to himself. They have an opportunity to save Tony. He’ll grab on to that, with both hands if he has to.

Rhodes keeps his eyes fixed on Bucky as he says, “Do it.”

And if Tony doesn’t make it?

Then Bucky will be here to follow him into the next life.

* * *

There is no footage remaining from when AIM infected Pepper with the virus, all destroyed in the explosions that had destroyed the oil tanker. Tony hadn’t been there to watch, hadn’t even really known about it until she’d risen from the dead. Pepper herself doesn’t like to talk about it. Tony had once told Bucky when they’d been sharing a bed after a particularly bad nightmare that there had been a few journalists who had asked Pepper about the experience in the months following her kidnapping. It had taken three panic attacks before Tony had threatened to blackball anyone else who asked about it.

When Bucky had first moved into the tower, Nat had told him about the virus running through Pepper’s veins. For a while, he’d thought that she didn’t even have any of the side effects anymore, that Tony had succeeded in removing the virus altogether. He’d eventually come to realize that that wasn’t it at all. Pepper still had the virus, could still use her newfound powers, but she kept an iron clamp on them, using an impressive amount of willpower and control to keep a lid on her abilities.

He’s only seen her lose control twice and both times, the most he’d seen happen—beside the shifting fire beneath her skin—was a doorknob melting and a teapot overheating. He has no idea exactly how bad Extremis can be.

Cho had told them that the process would be painful but Bucky hadn’t realized just how _god-fucking-awful_ it would be. She lets them into the operating theater behind walls of thick glass, tells them that if this goes wrong, it won’t matter whether they’re watching the procedure or in the waiting room. For the most part, Bucky’s grateful. It means that he gets to see Tony at least one more time.

But it also means that he gets to watch as Tony screams and convulses when Cho injects Extremis into his arm.

Cho is the only doctor in the room. All others had been evacuated when they had decided on Extremis. Tony is strapped down to the table, naked and shivering. The wound in his shoulder—the one Bucky had given him—is stitched up but his stomach is still gushing out blood and pus from whatever infection he’d caught. Bucky watches and wonders how he’s still alive. He’s seen wounds like before, in both the army and as the Winter Soldier. They don’t last long. But Tony’s strong, Bucky reminds himself. He has to be or else he wouldn’t still be here.

Extremis is a colorless, odorless liquid, remarkable only because Bucky knows what it can do but otherwise completely ordinary looking. Cho has a vial of it—and maybe he should be concerned that she’s apparently just carrying it around with her but it’s a quick thought that flits across his mind—that she pulls up into a needle and then injects slowly into Tony’s bicep.

There are some medications out there that are painful to inject—Extremis, apparently, is one of them. Tony cries out as she injects it, a sound so piteous and hurt that it breaks Bucky’s heart just to hear it.

Then they wait.

As Tony screams.

As he tries to curl around his stomach.

As fire lights up his skin from the inside, veins glowing with something unearthly and _terrifying_.

As his wrists rip free from his bindings and Steve leaps over the rows of chairs to get to the door, Bucky hot on his heels.

As Tony sobs out, “It _hurts,_ ” and Bucky presses a kiss to his soulmark— _Bucky’s_ soulmark—and whispers, “I know, sweet thing. I know it does.”

As Tony’s back arches again as he screams and the flesh on his hands turns so hot, it sears into Bucky’s hands and Bucky yells.

As Extremis finds the arc reactor and it glows an impossibly brighter blue, blinding and whirring loud enough that even Cho covers her ears and Bucky thinks he’ll go deaf.

As the lights flicker in the hospital and then _pop pop pop_ as the bulbs burst, plunging them all into darkness.

As Tony shudders and stills, the fire in his veins dying away.

As the mark on Bucky’s metal arm melts away to reveal a robin in flight and Bucky screams his grief, a wail matched by Steve’s sobs.

And then—as Cho tugs them both away, tells them they have to move back, and Bucky can’t—he _can’t_ —because Tony is there and he’s _lost_ him and all Bucky wants to do is follow him.

“Sergeant Barnes, _look_ ,” Cho urges him. He turns his head to see grey-black stone creeping up over Tony’s feet, like the volcanic rock he’s seen in those documentaries Nat sometimes watches late at night when she doesn’t feel safe enough to go straight to Tony’s room. Startled, Bucky drops Tony’s hand and backs away. The rock crawls up and up and up, encasing his legs and then his torso, climbs over his hands and arms, up his neck, spreads across his face, until every inch of Tony’s body is covered in it.

Small cracks form in the solidified rock. Bucky watches as red light pulses within them and with each pulse, his mark flickers between phoenix and robin.

Phoenix.

Robin.

Phoenix.

* * *

Cho bandages up the blisters on Bucky’s hand. His is worse than Steve’s. Steve’s hand has small blisters, probably fine by tomorrow. Bucky probably would have needed skin grafts if it hadn’t been for the serum. He chalks it up to his version being bastardized and not the pure version Steve had gotten.

“Did you know?” Sharon asks, casting a glance at Tony’s body.

Cho shakes her head. “Pepper never said anything about a cocoon.”

“Does this mean it worked?”

“Possibly,” Cho allows. “Possibly not. This isn’t AIM’s version. The compounds we included to stabilize it have different side effects.”

That, Bucky could have told her, is obvious. He looks at the pulsing light between the cracks in Tony’s casing, runs a thumb over his mark ( _robin—phoenix—robin_ ), thinks he knows what it must have been like for Tony all those years, living with a mark that couldn’t decide if his soulmate was alive or dead. He’s been wondering, ever since he found that Tony is theirs, how Tony could have covered up his mark. He gets it now. Never knowing if the mark would settle on fully gone, the stress of the constant flicker, it’s enough to make him want to cover it up.

Nat’s small hand settles into his metal one. She gives him a reassuring smile and leans over to whisper in his ear, “Don’t worry. Tony’s like a cockroach.” He wants to laugh but he remembers the worry he’d seen in her eyes in the waiting room. Her fingers brush up against his mark ( _phoenix—robin—phoenix_ ).

Bruce asks the question they’ve all been dying to ask, “How long will it last?”

“I don’t know. This is—” Cho stops, mouth twisting in a moue of distaste. “This is magic in all but name.”

Magic is more Thor’s domain than anyone else’s but he looks as baffled as the rest of them feel. “Magic is my mother’s purview,” he tells them. He hesitates and looks at Clint. “And my brother’s. I could travel to Asgard, seek their assistance.”

“No,” Steve tells him. “You should stay here. With us.”

Thor looks gratified that he won’t be asked to go, that he’ll be allowed to stay and watch over Tony. “Thank you,” he murmurs.

Bucky’s eyes stay on Steve. He seems to have recovered from the shock and grief that had so overwhelmed him in HYDRA’s fortress and lingered in the waiting room. He’s pulled himself back together, standing as tall as he did before Ophelia got her hooks into them. Bucky hadn’t seen it before now, too overwhelmed first by Ophelia and then by the Asset and what had been done to him but it’s clear now: Steve had been faltering. The weight of his guilt and the conviction that he couldn’t tell anyone about his suspicions and the insecurity that Ophelia must have driven into his heart every time she ignored him for Bucky had torn him down. It feels like they haven’t rested in months and perhaps they haven’t, trading their sorrow over Tony for the false relief brought by a fake soulmate and then even that for the uncertainty and fear from Tony’s kidnapping and now the terror at the thought of losing him.

But Steve is straightening now, assuming leadership again. Bucky wants to be proud of him but his heart is weary and the grief still too new. He’s never been as good at shaking things off as Steve, who had taken every single rejection from the army and turned it into the fire to fuel his rage for when he was finally accepted.

Unwittingly, Bucky’s eyes flick to Natasha. She’s been the team leader for almost two years now and she’s done a wonderful job with it. She should be the one telling Thor he can stay, should be organizing shifts to watch over Tony, should be calling Pepper to give her an update, but she seems content to stand beside Bucky. Steve turns to them just slightly, not even really to them, more to Cho to ask her a question about Extremis but it’s just enough to have Nat shrinking back into Bucky’s side, enough for Bucky to realize that he’s missed more than a kidnapping during his time as the Asset.

“Nat and I will take first shift,” he says aloud. “The rest of you should find a hotel. Get some sleep.”

Rhodes opens his mouth to protest. Sharon beats him to the punch. “We can stay,” she says but she sounds exhausted already.

“We don’t need to. Tony won’t be alone. We all know he’d be worried sick if he knew we were pushing ourselves to be here. Go rest.”

It says something that there are no further arguments, just agreement and a brief discussion about who will take over from Nat and Bucky in four hours. Steve drifts a little closer. Nat drifts away.

“Are you sure?” Steve asks. “I can stay—”

“Stevie,” Bucky says firmly. “Go.” Steve eyes him for a minute and then acquiesces without any further discussion.

On the other side of the glass, the light pulses and Steve and Bucky’s marks answer ( _phoenix—robin—phoenix_ ).

* * *

“So what happened between you and Steve?” he asks a few hours later. They’re sitting now beside Tony’s bed in those terribly uncomfortable hospital chairs. Before she left, Cho had deemed it safe to move Tony to one of the rooms, a task that had fallen to Steve and Bucky as the only ones able to handle Tony’s still overheated body.

Nat looks down at her clasped hands. There’s a StarkPad on the floor beside her but she hasn’t touched it since she came in here, too busy watching over Tony to even look at it. “We fought,” she says simply.

Bucky gives her a mock-surprised gasp. “No, really?” he asks sarcastically, drawing a reluctant smile from her. “I figured that. What about?”

“Tony.”

Bucky hadn’t expected anything else, not after the terrible days they’ve all had, but he still frowns. “Why?”

She tells him, about Tony knowing he’s their soulmate and Steve’s perceived rejection, about how Tony had wanted to tell them but she’d convinced them to wait, about how the mission she’d been sent on had thrown off her plans, and then about how Steve had blamed her for things going wrong.

“Hmm,” Bucky hums once she’s finished. “Seems kind of harsh.”

She shrugs, looking remarkably unconcerned for someone who had flinched when Steve looked at her the wrong way. “Grief and fear are powerful motivators. I can’t blame him when he’s not exactly wrong.”

“We’re grown adults. Any one of us could have spoken up. Tony could have said something to me and Steve; fuck, he could have said something all the way back when he saw Steve’s mark. Steve and I could have asked him out.”

“Tony _would_ have said something if I hadn’t given him bad advice,” she reminds him. “You would have known that that night was a date if I’d told Clint what was going on or been there like I should have been.”

Bucky sits back in his chair. “Why are you taking all the blame, Nat?” he asks. “Not all of it is yours.”

She says darkly, “No, but enough of it is.”

They’re both quiet for a while. Bucky still thinks she’s shouldering too much of the blame but then again, he understands more than a little about laying the blame solely on himself. It had taken him and Tony months for him to finally understand that the blame for Tony’s parents didn’t lie with him, longer still to accept that the team fully believed that he couldn’t be blamed for anything he’d done under HYDRA’s rule (as Clint had put it, “You can’t blame the country’s longest held prisoner of war for things he did to survive.”).

The hospital is still dark. The power surge Extremis had caused hadn’t just fried the lights. It had fried the generators and the backup generators and a couple additional city blocks surrounding the hospital. Rhodes had spent nearly two hours on the phone with police, reassuring them there wasn’t an attack on the hospital, they didn’t need to call the Avengers.

Then there had been the phones and computers, many of them overloaded with data. Rhodey had taken the team’s fried ones—Bucky’s included—and said he was going to see if JARVIS could figure anything out from them. Sharon had called Pepper to ask if she had seen anything like this when AIM had captured her. Pepper had regretfully told her no. There had been explosions but not huge electrical surges.

Rhodes had smiled fondly at Tony. “Still causing mysteries,” he’d murmured before leaving with the others.

Down the hall, Bucky can hear a nurse murmuring to one of the patients too unstable to be moved when the hospital had been evacuated. The hospital kept portable generators, not hooked up to anything, for events exactly such as this one. Luckily, none of them had been fried during the surge.

Between them, Tony sleeps, encased in his volcanic rock. The mark on Bucky’s arm has been stuck on the phoenix for the last thirty minutes. He chooses to take that as a good sign, that Tony’s body is internalizing with Extremis, that Tony will be _okay_. The balance, so delicately hovering between life and death, is finally tipping toward life.

“You know Steve will eventually forgive you,” he says quietly.

She nods. “He will and he’ll probably apologize blaming me. But he’s also probably blaming himself right now. Sam said he’s been doing that since we found out Tony was missing. So, in the meantime, I’m happy to take as much of it as he needs.”

“Selfless of you.”

She gives him a sly grin and he knows that she’s ready to turn from such a heavy topic. “Nonsense,” she says, cheerfully enough. “Steve’s going to beg my forgiveness by offering to massage my feet. He always does.”

* * *

Clint and Thor come to relieve them sometime in the early morning. They’re given the address of the hotel the rest of the team is staying at and then they set off into the dark streets. Even the streetlamps are burned out, the shattered glass of the bulbs glittering around their feet.

They say their goodbyes in the elevator as Nat gets off on the third floor. Bucky gets off on the fifth, weary feet dragging him to the room he’s sharing with Steve. There’s a lamp turned on beside the bed. Judging by the way, Steve’s all but strewn across the bed, the lamp isn’t on for comfort but rather because he’d been too tired to turn it off before he fell asleep. Bucky is exhausted as well but he’s still covered in blood. He trudges to the bathroom and turns on the shower.

When he emerges, clean and mostly dry and naked as the day he was born because he hasn’t spotted a change of clothes anywhere and he’s not willing to get dressed in the bloody ones again, Steve is awake and leaning up against the headboard.

“Hey,” Steve says softly. “When did you get in?”

“Fifteen minutes ago,” Bucky replies. He finishes toweling off his hair and tosses the towel back into the bathroom, heedless of where it lands.

“How’s Tony?”

Bucky glances back down at his wrist. The mark had changed back to the robin an hour ago; Bucky had punched a hole in the wall. It had flickered back to the phoenix while he’d been in the shower but that hadn’t kept his heart from stopping when he’d first seen the robin.

“The same. He’s alive longer though. Think that’s a good sign.”

He pauses, dragging his eyes down Steve’s bare chest. They haven’t been intimate together in months. Ophelia had kept claiming that she wanted to wait for sex and the two of them had felt wrong having sex without her. Privately, Bucky had felt grateful, uncomfortable with the thought of sharing their bed with someone who wasn’t Tony. He’d never told Steve that; it had been obvious that Steve had been trying to get over Tony. He’d suspected that Steve had had his own private reasons for not wanting to have sex, dealing with his insecurities at the way Ophelia constantly ignored him. In the end, it hadn’t mattered what the reason was, first Ophelia and then Bucky’s doubts and then Steve’s insecurities and finally the Asset. The end result is the same: Bucky _misses_ him.

“Steve,” he whispers, taking a step closer. “Stevie, can I—?”

Steve’s eyes go dark and he holds out his hand. “Come here,” he murmurs. “Let me take care of you.”

* * *

Bucky is draped across Steve’s chest, drawing absent circles around his nipples. Steve hums with oversensitivity each time he gets too close but Bucky’s too relaxed and drowsy to really care. He really just wants to go to sleep—he knows Steve is on the verge of dozing off again—however, there’s something he needs to get off his chest, something that he’s been thinking about for a long time.

“I think we moved too fast,” he says. The words are quiet but the room is otherwise silent and they echo in the still air.

Steve shifts under him so he can prop his head up to look at him. “Too…fast?” he repeats.

Bucky nods. He doesn’t want to have to say this but he needs to, needs Steve to know why this is going to happen. “I didn’t even have a fraction of my memories back when you showed up—”

“Buck—” Steve begins but Bucky lays a finger across his lips to shush him.

“I loved having you there. I did. And you being there helped those memories come back faster. When you were there, it was like I was Bucky— _your_ Bucky—all over again.” He pauses and takes a deep breath.

“But I’m not him. I haven’t been him since I fell from the train. Bucky was dangerous but I’m lethal. I’ve got a different soulmark and different experiences. I don’t even talk much like him anymore. And I was so busy trying to remember everything that I lost that I never stopped to think about who I am now. I think we both forgot that I’m not the same person I was and—and it was _amazing_ pretending that I could be him again but…”

The mark on Steve’s wrist flickers lightning quick— _robin, phoenix_ —and Bucky picks it up to press a soft kiss to it. “In a way,” he begins again, “I’m almost glad Ophelia showed up.”

“Glad,” Steve says flatly.

“Not for what all happened but she reminded me that I’m not just Bucky Barnes anymore. I’m someone else now and I think—I think I need to figure out who that is.”

“What are you saying?” Steve asks but there’s a cautious tone to his words that makes Bucky think that he already knows exactly what he’s saying.

Even so, he explains, “I’m saying it’s a bad idea to bring Tony into our relationship when I don’t know who I am and it’s a worse idea to try and pretend like I don’t know something’s wrong. I’m saying…I’m saying I think I need to leave.”

He’s expecting Steve to argue. Steve’s never been one to give up on what he wants— _who_ he wants—and he’s often convinced of his own rightness, which leads to argument after argument until Bucky gets tired of arguing and gives in. And the way that his jaw is set sure looks like he’s leading up to an argument. But then, all at once, Steve slumps, jaw relaxing.

“Will you be coming back?” Steve asks defeatedly.

Bucky blinks, so surprised that Steve hadn’t put up a fight that he almost forgets to respond. But maybe that makes sense too. Steve had been the one to track him down after D.C. and he had been the one to want to find their third and gotten Tony hurt in the process. Bucky doesn’t know Steve as well as he used to but he still knows him plenty well enough to know that Steve’s probably laying there thinking that he has no right to ask Bucky to stay. And on the one hand, Bucky wants to reassure him that Steve doesn’t need to expect everyone to just give up on him and leave but on the other hand…he really doesn’t want to have to argue right now.

“Course I am,” he says eventually. “This isn’t forever, just long enough to figure out who I am.”

“I know who you are,” Steve replies. He leans down to give Bucky an upside down kiss. “You are James Buchanan Barnes, who had a robin on his wrist, and you are the Winter Soldier, who has a phoenix on his. And above all else, you are Tony Stark’s soulmate. And I know all that. I know that you’re mine and his and your own person before any of that ever matters. I know _you_. But if you feel that you don’t, that you need to go to figure that out, then I’ll let you and when you come back, I’ll be right there waiting for you.”

Bucky smiles and kisses him again. “You’re unfairly good at those speeches.”

Steve laughs. “Comes with the serum.”

They both chuckle over that for a few minutes and then spend another couple minutes after that just kissing but then Steve pulls away. “You think Tony’s gonna forgive us?”

Bucky grimaces. “I wouldn’t if I were him. But Tony’s Tony and he might surprise us both.”

Steve studies his face and then states, “You don’t think he will though.”

“Eventually, sure. In the meantime? We’re gonna be groveling for a while.”

“If he wakes up,” Steve says softly, so softly that even Bucky has to strain to hear it.

“No,” he replies firmly. “ _When_.”

* * *

A day passes.

Then another.

And Tony doesn’t waken until the dawn of the third day. Steve and Bucky are entering the hospital, taking over from Sharon and Rhodes, when the lights suddenly turn on. They’ve been out this entire time. The hospital had had electricians sent in to try and get everything up and running again but the electricians had come back baffled, stated that everything should be working, it just…wasn’t.

For the lights to be working now…

Bucky takes off at a dead run for Tony’s room, Steve right behind him. They skid around the corner of the room—Steve nearly keeps going but manages to catch himself on the doorframe and stop dead.

Rhodes has his head buried in his hands, sobbing. Sharon, on the other hand, is in Tony’s lap, clutching him tightly as silent tears stream down her cheeks. And Tony—Tony is sitting up surrounded by scattered pieces of volcanic rock, bewildered but holding on to Sharon just as tightly.

“We’re okay,” he murmurs over and over again. His gaze flicks up to the two supersoldiers and Bucky nearly collapses into a seat. The lines on Tony’s face have smoothed out. The crow’s feet at the corners of his eyes are gone. The tiny, minute scars on his face from countless accidents that Bucky’s never heard about are missing. The traces of grey that Tony likes to deny the existence of have disappeared entirely, leaving fluffy brown curls that Bucky longs to run his fingers through. He looks so _young_ , younger than Bucky’s ever seen him—maybe ten, fifteen years—though he thinks he can feel the Asset stir in recognition at the sight. More than all of that, he looks _healthy_.

“Hey,” Tony says and smiles at the two of them.

Bucky can’t do anything but smile helplessly back. Tony’s okay. Tony is here and he’s alive and Bucky’s so happy, he thinks he could burst.

* * *

Cho shoos them all out so she can do a complete examination without Tony trying to ask them about what had happened and babbling over her when she tries to ask him questions. It doesn’t stop Tony from texting Rhodes though, demanding to know how he’d gotten to a hospital and why he looked so young and—Bucky pretends like he isn’t reading over Rhodes’ shoulder when he sees this one—are Steve and Bucky really that happy to see him.

There’s something off about it but Bucky doesn’t piece together what it is until Cho’s letting them back in the room, even as Tony’s still texting Rhodes furiously, and then they see that Tony doesn’t have a phone in his hands.

“How did you do that?” Bucky asks slowly.

To his surprise, Tony looks a little frightened—or perhaps just overwhelmed—but he covers it up with one of those press smiles that Bucky hates so much. “Extremis,” Tony says. “It needs a power source.”

He glances at Cho and she picks up the thread, “In a perfectly healthy human, like Pepper, it would have bonded to their neurons, to their cells. But Tony isn’t—or rather, wasn’t—healthy and he has foreign technology in his body.”

“The arc reactor,” Steve says.

“And the sensors for the suit,” Tony chimes in.

“Exactly,” Cho continues. “The arc reactor is the most powerful power source on the planet. When Extremis tried to bond, it bonded with the technology. And like its predecessor, Extremis didn’t just heal him, it gave him abilities instead.”

Tony finishes, “But because it bonded with the technology instead of my cells, I don’t get any of the fire powers that Pepper has. I get this technology stuff instead.”

“Technomancer,” Sharon mutters.

“You shut your mouth,” Tony replies but there’s no heat behind it.

“How do you know?” Bucky asks. “What all can you do?”

Tony shrugs. “You saw me texting Rhodey. But I also texted the team when I woke up. They’re walking through the doors now, which I know because I can see them through the security cameras. I can talk to JARVIS even though he’s nowhere around. I can—”

He’s starting to sound panicked and Bucky can’t blame him. He’d be scared too if he woke up to find that he’d lost years off his life and could do all this pseudo-magic stuff. In fact, come to think of it, that’s exactly how he’d reacted after he’d woken up the first time during HYDRA’s experiments.

He reaches out and grabs Tony’s hand. Tony immediately goes silent. “It’s okay,” he reassures him. “The team isn’t gonna mind that you can do all this. Clint’s gonna bitch about how you’re the one who gets to look younger and not him and Sam’s gonna ask if you can upgrade his wings without even working on them now and the rest of us are all too relieved that you’re _alive_ to care about what Extremis did. Besides, you’re still our Tony.”

Tony looks up at him with big, vulnerable eyes and fuck if they’re not a thousand times more powerful now that he looks so young. “ _Our_ Tony?” he repeats.

“Yeah,” Bucky says with a decisive nods. “Ours.”

* * *

Tony gets to go home less than twenty-four hours later. Cho wants to keep him under further observation but as he seems to be perfectly stable, she’s willing to do it at the tower. The Bulgarian government would like them out of there, citing first that the Avengers tend to bring trouble wherever it is they go and then that they would like the man who managed to bring down multiple city blocks out of their country. Bucky doesn’t blame them and Tony seems amazed by the fact that he was even able to do that so no one is offended. They’re all eager to be home anyway.

Pepper greets them at the tower by throwing herself first onto Tony and then onto Rhodes, sobbing about her boys and how Tony isn’t allowed to do that ever again. Tony quips, “Tears for your long lost boss?” It sounds like it’s supposed to be an inside joke but Pepper just sobs harder.

Tony awkwardly pats her back and says, “It’s okay. We get to be superpower buddies now,” and that at least manages to get a watery chuckle out of her.

Tony settles back in easily enough. After nearly a week of constant observation by Dr. Cho, she finally declares him stable and healthy and lets him remove all of the leads and sensors off his body. Tony celebrates by hosting a marathon movie night, complete with several buckets of popcorn, an elaborate pillow fort, and way more beer than the team needs.

He makes up with Nat that night. Bucky hadn’t even realized they were arguing but he figures it’s not that big of a stretch considering she’d also been fighting with Steve. It takes a little longer for Tony and Steve to start talking again but by the end of two weeks, they’ve apparently made up although Steve comes back to their bedroom that night to tell him that Tony knows they want to date him but is still too hurt by what they did to be ready for it.

“Did you argue with him about it?” Bucky asks cautiously, not wanting to offend but also hoping that Steve hadn’t just ruined their chances by pushing the issue.

Steve gives him a slightly offended look but just says, “No. It’s his choice. After the way we fucked him over, neither of us has the right to ask for more.”

Bucky gives him a long, appraising look. This is the second time Steve’s let someone make their own decision even though he doesn’t agree with it. Maybe it hadn’t been just Tony and Bucky who had been changed by this experience.

“When are you leaving?” Steve asks suddenly.

“Tomorrow,” Bucky replies. “I’ve got a flight to Germany in the morning.”

He’s still convinced that this is the best decision he could make. He needs time—time to get his head screwed back on right, to figure himself out, to decide what it is exactly that he wants. Steve’s come to accept his decision, really truly accept it rather than just nominally. Nat and Clint both know why he’s going and they’ve thrown their full support behind it. He just wishes he’d found the time to tell Tony.

It’s not that he’s been avoiding Tony since they came back to the tower. It’s just that…he doesn’t know what to say to him. “I’m sorry I almost got you killed?” “I’m sorry you’re our soulmate and not the soulmate of someone who actually deserves you?” “I’m sorry we gave up on you?” They’ve run into each other a couple of times in the hallway and each time, Bucky’s opened his mouth and so has Tony and then Tony snaps his mouth shut and keeps on walking. He’s pretty sure Tony isn’t any angrier at him than he had been at Steve but he also doesn’t know what to say to someone that he shot (Nat doesn’t count; she’d shot him back).

“Tomorrow,” he says again and Steve hums consideringly.

* * *

He’s throwing the last couple items in his bag when he hears a quiet knock on the door and then Tony saying, “Hey, soldier.”

Bucky almost jumps, using every ounce of his training not to startle. Once upon a time, Tony wouldn’t have been capable of doing that at all but Extremis had made him quieter. These days, if Tony doesn’t want to be heard, he isn’t.

“Steve told me you were leaving,” Tony continues, moving into the room when Bucky doesn’t do anything more discouraging than grunt. “Said you wanted to figure out who you are now.”

Bucky finally turns. Tony looks gorgeous in the early morning sunlight streaming in through the windows. He’s wearing an over-sized hoodie, hands jammed into the front pocket. Cho had said that Tony was probably biologically closer to his early twenties, which apparently means that Tony, who had had his final growth spurt when he was twenty-five, lost about two inches. Just about everything he owns now is over-sized and it gives Bucky a small thrill each time he spots Tony’s shirt sliding off his shoulder or the hem of his pants dragging on the ground. He wonders if this is what Tony will look like once he’s finally in _Bucky’s_ clothes.

He’s probably been quiet too long, judging by the way Tony’s shifting back and forth. “I know you’re leaving,” Tony continues. “I got a notification when you bought the plane ticket.”

Bucky nods, unsurprised. Tony’s taken to Extremis like a duck to water. Just the other day, Clint had stolen the last donut out of the box and Tony had retaliated by turning every single light red when Clint had gone out for the day.

“Are you angry with me?” he asks curiously, looking at the way Tony seems to be avoiding his gaze. “For leaving?”

Tony shakes his head. “I wanted to do the same thing after Afghanistan. Didn’t since apparently you can’t just leave your company in the lurch after you kill the CEO but I wanted to.”

“Then why aren’t you looking at me?”

“Thought maybe you were angry at _me_ , for not telling you or whatever.”

And Bucky gets it then, gets why Tony’s being fiddly and not looking at him, why he hasn’t wanted to talk in two weeks. Tony’s abandonment issues are written all over his file. There’s no way that Tony hadn’t found out that Bucky had been under HYDRA’s influence and _not_ thought that Bucky would blame him after it came out that Tony could have done something about it.

“I’m not angry,” he promises him, stepping closer so he can run his hands down Tony’s arms. “I’m _not_. I missed you, doll, but I get it. We really hurt you. It couldn’t have been easy knowing that you could help but that you’d have to give up that secret.”

“I kept it for so long,” Tony whispers. “And I was ready to tell you and you just called me a _friend_ like I didn’t even register in your mind.”

Bucky pulls him in, hugs him tight. “I wanted that date to be real,” he whispers back. “I was so hurt that Nat sent us to the place we wanted to take you and then there you were, looking like a fucking vision, and I couldn’t have it so I hurt you instead.”

“I should’ve said something when you thought you found your third. This might not have happened then.”

Bucky nods. “Maybe not. But maybe HYDRA would’ve gotten to me some other way. We all failed here, sweet thing.”

Tony shivers. “I like that,” he admits.

Bucky smiles, slow and easy. “When I call you pretty names?” he asks. Tony nods, shivering again, and maybe they’re not ready for anything more just yet but Bucky’s going to leave, not knowing when he’s coming back.

“I know you’re still hurt,” he begins hesitantly. “But can I kiss you before I go?”

Tony looks up at him and smiles, bright as the sun. “Only if I can kiss you back.” Bucky laughs and leans in to lay the gentlest of kisses across Tony’s smiling mouth, there and gone again. He pulls away to see a thoroughly unimpressed look on Tony’s face as Tony says, “Can’t you do better than that?”

Bucky growls and pulls Tony up against his body and kisses him again, hard this time, tracing Tony’s lips with his tongue, sliding in to stroke the inside of his mouth. He walks them backward until Tony runs into a wall and then he just hitches him up. Tony wraps his legs around Bucky’s hips, slides his hands up into Bucky’s hair, and kisses him back with every bit as much passion and hunger that Bucky is kissing him with.

“You need to leave soon,” Tony pants as Bucky tears his mouth away to bite bruises down Tony’s neck.

“Says who?” Bucky asks. “I’ve got a soulmate who can turn the lights green for me.”

Tony laughs and the lights in the room brighten just a little.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Extremis ex machina, anyone?


End file.
